Hello
by bravevulnerability
Summary: 'The glimpse of her face, her smile illuminating his screen, causes his chest to burn, consumed by fire that chars his heart. He loves her, but it's not enough. It's too much. And he can't take anymore.' An alternate end to season 4 that changes everything.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I've received so many prompts concerning this song on every forum possible. I hope this lives up to the expectations.**

* * *

 _"I must have called a thousand times_  
 _To tell you I'm sorry for everything that I've done_  
 _But when I call you never seem to be home_  
 _Hello from the outside_  
 _At least I can say that I've tried_  
 _To tell you I'm sorry for breaking your heart_  
 _But it don't matter. It clearly doesn't tear you apart anymore"_

 _-Hello, Adele_

* * *

"Hey, Castle," she begins, shivering beneath the cool breeze of the air conditioning and casting her eyes down to the toes of her boots. "I know that after everything I said... I know you have every right to be angry, but I just wanted to say that I'm sorry. For all of it, Rick. I'm so sorry," she whispers, touching her fingers to the damp skin of her cheeks, ready to catch any renegade tears. "Please call me back."

Kate ends the call, ceases her pacing in the hallway outside of his front door. He isn't home, he would have answered her knocking, but he's sending her calls to voicemail and she shouldn't push, should give him the time to decide if he wants her in his life or not on his own.

Especially after she was the one to kick him out of hers.

He had told her they were over last night, but… but she's said the same to him and they had managed to repair the damage done. And it was different this time, she was different now. The fight on the roof with Maddox, hanging from the ledge of a building by her fingertips had put everything in perspective, had shown her what she truly wanted - _who_ she truly wanted – and if she could just tell him that… It can't really be over, can it?

Beckett starts back towards the elevator, wincing as her scars pull, fresh bruises flaring with every movement now that the spike of adrenaline has passed. Maybe it was better this way, for both of them; she would go home, tend to the new injuries Maddox had bestowed upon her, and maybe tomorrow, Castle would contact her.

Though, she had foolishly hoped that tonight, it would be his bed she slept in, his hands, his lips, kissing her bruises.

Kate holds onto her phone, her pockets too damp from the rain to store the device, and slumps into the wall of the elevator as the doors slide closed, gritting her teeth against the disappointment of going home alone.

* * *

The glimpse of her face, her smile illuminating his screen, causes his chest to burn, consumed by fire that chars his heart. He loves her, but it's not enough. It's too much. And he can't take anymore.

Rick silences the call, ignores the voicemail she leaves, certain it's just Detective Beckett requesting he return as her partner, offer insight on her mother's case that will send her deeper down the rabbit hole and nothing more. And every cell in his body comes alight with the need to call her back, to give her whatever she wants, no matter what it costs him.

He holds down the power button atop his iPhone, pockets the device, and pours another shot of whiskey. He'll be back home before Alexis tomorrow morning, but for tonight, he wants to drown his sorrows in the privacy of his secluded office within the Old Haunt. He just wants to drink until she no longer consumes his every thought.

* * *

Castle continues to ignore her calls throughout the summer and she eventually gives up hope of him ever answering, let alone calling her back. She returns to work as soon as possible, devotes every second of her time and energy to proving herself to Gates once more, reclaiming her place in the field and achieving her usual closure rate with ease. Every spare moment she pours into her mother's case, no longer falling into the rabbit hole, but diving without thought instead.

There's nothing left for her to lose and part of her thinks that maybe if she solves the case, finds justice for her mother, she'll finally feel whole. And that empty space he left will no longer ache so fiercely.

But she still carves out a minute for Castle every few weeks, after she arrives home from work to the dark, lonely space of her apartment. It reminds her of visiting her mother's grave, as morbid as the comparison sounds, settling atop her bed with her phone against her ear, already knowing he won't answer, but unable to resist the urge to talk to him nonetheless.

Like calling a ghost.

The greeting of his voicemail box is no longer cheerful, but it still eases the sharp pain inside her chest each time she hears it. He changed it sometime in June, replacing the goofy welcoming to a simple, somber response of "Hello, you've reached Richard Castle, leave your message at the tone".

"Hey, it's me," she murmurs, curling her knees in against her chest to quell the fissures that splice through her heart, deepening every time the sound of his voice fills her ear. "I heard about your book tour today and I just wanted to wish you a safe trip. I - I don't know if you ever listen to these messages, if you'd prefer I stop leaving them, but I just... I miss you, Castle. And I'm sorry."

Kate ends the call and presses the phone to her chest, tilts her head back against the wall, promises herself that this phone call was the last. She hasn't spoken to him in four months and his silence tells her all she needs to know.

He no longer wants to hear from her.

* * *

"Richard, why don't you just call the girl back and tell her one way or another?" Martha questions in exasperation, waving her hand at the phone in his grasp that he promptly silences.

The familiar glimpse of her face still lingers behind his eyelids, though. He should really just delete the photo, leave her contact faceless, but he just… he loved that picture of her.

"She's called you consistently throughout the last few months, kiddo. Don't you think that it would at least bring you some closure to answer just once?"

His plane boards in half an hour and he still needs to go through security, he doesn't have the time for another lecture from his mother on the topic of Kate Beckett. He's had enough this past year to last a lifetime.

"Mother, I'm handling this my way," he sighs, slinging his carryon over his shoulder, but his mother catches his arm.

"Do you even listen to the messages she leaves?"

Castle shakes his head. "I don't need to, but I do have to go Mother, so please-"

"Richard, I told you, love is not a switch-"

"Just remember to keep an eye out for Alexis, don't let her go overboard with this new internship," he instructs, reciting lines he's already stated and embracing his mother in a brief, one-armed hug before he turns towards the line for security. "And maybe try to discourage this revived sense of urgency to attend Stanford?"

Martha huffs in frustration but nods her assurances, calls out her love to him before turning on her heel, strolling back towards the airport's exit with her head still shaking in disapproval.

His mother is right, to an extent – his love for Kate has never been a switch, not one he had the power to turn off anyway, but he had done a decent job of quieting the longing over the last few months, the heartache still ever present but tamed into a dull roar that merely leaves him feeling hollow.

Castle withdraws his phone from the pocket of his jeans while he awaits the line for security to crawl forward, stares at the notification telling him he's missed her call, that he has a new voicemail from her to add to the collection. He doesn't listen to them, but he can't find the will to delete them either.

It's unhealthy and he knows his mother has a point, that he should respond to Kate in some form, even if it's only to tell her to leave him be. But he had already told her they were over once, did he really have to do it again?

He hadn't wanted to say it the first time.

Rick tucks his phone back into his pocket, inches forward with the line and prepares to transfer all of his belongings onto the cart. The book tour will be good for him, a month long trip throughout the entirety of the United States, and maybe seeing his fans, the excitement his writing can bring to others will help inspire him again. Maybe it would make him feel something other than grief.

He may not be happy, he didn't expect to be, but in this state of emptiness, it was easier not to miss her so much.

* * *

She had been doing so well, not touching her phone for anything other than business purposes for the last three months, the urge to call if only to hear the familiar comfort of his voicemail always present, but she ignores it, denies the idea that she needs him. She was fine in the years before she met him. Not happy, but surviving, making it, and she would find her footing back in that state of mind. It was just going to take some time and a lot of self-discipline.

But after only a few weeks in DC, after an overwhelming slew of high profile cases that Kate just knows he would love, she caves. She can survive on her own, she always has, but Castle had spoiled her throughout those last four years, made her want more than that.

"Hey Castle," she sighs, fiddling with a pen at her kitchen table, gripping it between her jittery fingers and damp palm. "I know it's been awhile, since I called, but I didn't want to… I don't want to bother you, I've just been working in Washington DC with the FBI and we had this case today, and I can't talk about it, but I wish - you would have loved this stuff. But um, I was just hoping that you're doing well, that you're happy. Bye."

Beckett buries her face in her hands and scrapes her fingers through her hair, trying not to replay how stupid she sounded over and over again in her head.

* * *

He haunts the precinct once he learns of her new job in DC, attempting to subtly learn how she's doing from Ryan and Esposito without asking outright, even though her boys sometimes look at him like a traitor every time he speaks her name. Which isn't often.

Saying her name makes the pieces of shrapnel embedded in his chest burn brighter.

Too many times to count, he peruses flights to Washington online, sifts through the scenarios in his head, how it would be to see her again, to surprise her. He wants to call her back, wants to listen to all of the voice messages he has saved on his phone but has yet to touch. Another three months have gone by since Kate's last call, but despite the length of time that has passed, she still hasn't given up on hoping he'll answer her apparently.

Maybe it's pointless to fight his feelings for her. They refuse to dissipate no matter how hard he tries to rid her from his thoughts, his heart. She doesn't cross his mind every second anymore, no, but there hasn't been a day since their last fight that he isn't mourning Kate Beckett in some way.

Because he still loves her.

They destroy one another, he's told himself the facts too many times to count, but it never seems to make a difference where his stubborn heart is concerned. She needs him, he thinks, whether she would admit it or not. And in the same way, he needs her too.

* * *

Returning to New York terrifies her and she _hates_ that it's because of a man, a man who she can't seem to stop missing, stop calling. But she had been fired from her job and staying in DC was not an option she wanted to even consider.

New York will always be her home, but he still had her heart, was out walking around with it somewhere in this city, and she didn't have the willpower, the courage to go find him and get it back.

It takes her some time, but she eventually returns to the Twelfth, earns her spot back as a lead detective with the help of her former captain, and falls back into her old routines – working as much as possible, devoting every second of free time to her mother's case.

And finally, it pays off. But not without a price.

"Castle, I can't talk long, but I – something happened, with my mom's case," she whispers, hastily tossing only the essentials into an overnight bag along with a few fistfuls of clothing. She isn't running, but she did have to hide until those hunting her withdrew some of their efforts. "I have to ditch my phone, and I know that you're done, that I shouldn't even be calling but I…" Kate pauses for just a second, grips the phone tight enough to make her fingers ache and sucks in a shallow breath. "I don't know what's going to happen, and I know it's been too long, that I missed my chance to tell you this, but I love you. I just wanted you to know that."

Beckett ends the call and drops the phone to the floor, stands with her duffel bag, and crushes the device beneath her heel before she leaves.

* * *

Rick had made a deal with himself.

It's been a couple of months since her call from DC, but Ryan had informed him of how she had been fired for a rather admirable reason, always seeking justice and doing right by the victim, and how she was now back in the city, working for the Twelfth again.

He had listened to all of her voicemails in one sitting, his heart in his throat the entire time, and now, he had only one left, the one she left only twenty minutes ago. And once he listened to this one, he was going to call her back, _finally_ call her back, tell her that he was sorry for never answering, and invite her to meet him for coffee or dinner, whatever she wanted.

He was going to make this right, find a way to make them work.

But from the second Beckett's last message begins to play, Castle can tell that it's different, that something is wrong. The mention of her mother's case confirms it and he stands from his office chair, a cold sweat accumulating along the back of his neck the longer he listens.

 _I don't know what's going to happen, and I know it's been too long, that I missed my chance to tell you this, but I love you_. He nearly drops the phone, nearly chokes on his own breath. _I just wanted you to know that._

The line disconnects and Rick is stumbling out of his office, trying to call her back while he strides through the living room, but receiving the monotone voice of a recording telling him the number he's calling is no longer in working service at this time.

"No, no, no," he mumbles, scrambling for the front door, shoving the useless phone in his pocket and sprinting out into the hall, bypassing the elevators for the stairs. He doesn't know where she is now, but he'll head to the precinct first, consult with the boys.

He'll find her. He has to.

* * *

The alcohol is coursing through her veins, numbing everything, slowing the function of her brain that she fights to keep working, to keep focused. The world around her blurs with every blink, the dim lighting of the hotel room she had checked into tilting, threatening to spin.

Flashes of memory mingle with the distortions, glimpses of his face, the calming blue of his eyes. She wants to close hers, remain with the man she sees every time she drifts. In dreams, he is still hers even if in reality he never was. In her dreams, he was home when she showed up on his doorstep that night after the roof, during the storm.

"Get the gun, she's wasted."

Kate forces her eyes back open, watches Bracken's man with the alcohol place the half empty liquor bottle on the table nearby, and tries not to flinch at the deafening click of a gun's safety at her back.

She's been running for the last 48 hours and she's tired, so very tired, and no longer sure what she's running towards. Justice for her mother, punishment for the politician behind her murder, but then what? What without him-

"Let's get your finger in there," the leader of the two men coaxes, arranging her hand around the gun, her finger atop the trigger and the barrel to her temple while the man at her back steadies her shoulders. "It's almost over."

Beckett waits for the leader's nod, for the other to step back, and for the slightest pressure on her index finger. And then she slaps the gun away from her head, fires it backwards and hears the man at her back go down as she rises.

She struggles with the leader of the two, lands a high kick to his jaw before she can reclaim the gun he knocked out of her hand, fire two rounds into his chest and spit the pill he had shoved past her lips onto his dead body.

The break of glass over her head, the shower of whiskey drenching her hair, jerks a scream from her throat, the shards of the liquor bottle embedded into her scalp searing with pain, but she spins before she can acknowledge it, shoots the other man until she's certain he's dead.

Heat spills down the side of her face, trickling along her ear to cling at the hinge of her jaw and Kate lifts her hand to her head, sways with the swipe of her palm to the hot leak of blood oozing from her scalp and staining her skin.

The room is spinning, the combination of the alcohol and the fresh head wound has her balance wavering, and oh, this is so not good.

She turns, stumbles with it as her eyes roam over the floor of her hotel room, littered with dead hit men, and searches the blurring walls for the door. Her body dips and threatens to fall with every step, but she manages to reach the exit, closing her fingers around the doorknob and attempting to suck in a breath. She already knows, though, that her chances of making it much further are damned.

She's a fugitive, hunted by both William Bracken and a police force for a crime she didn't commit. She can't seek refuge in a hospital, can't drive, she's – fuck, she's not going to make it.

And she's so exhausted, in enough pain, that she may be able to make peace with this bitter end.

She had called him, received the familiar answer of his voicemail for the thousandth time, the last time, and said her goodbye. It was enough; it had to be.

Kate staggers out of the hotel room, glad for it, that she was able to have at least some small form of closure since she was never able to have him, and sways into the wall. The searing burn of the lacerations along her skull increase as her head makes contact with the hard surface, a glimpse of crimson smearing the wallpaper blooming in her peripheral.

Beckett loses all hope of staying upright, collapsing into the wall that had held her up and landing on her back. It's too much and she can't - can't even see straight, can't find the strength to heave herself back up.

She can only stare up at the blinding light of the ceiling and surrender.


	2. Chapter 2

"Kate." Her brow furrows at the gasp of her name, the sound of a voice that has haunted her for the last year. But never real. She's already fading, unsure how long she's actually remained lying on the hallway floor, maybe he's calling for her from that dreamland she knows so well, telling her to let go. "Oh, Kate. I've got you," his voice continues to soothe her, and – and someone is touching her, hands cradling her face, hovering along her wounds.

Kate peels her eyes open, fighting to focus on the blurry image of Castle on his knees above her, blue eyes alight with panic as he looks her over.

It isn't a dream.

"Castle?" she slurs, can't manage more than the attempt of his name before her head is lolling to the side, the picture of him disappearing, but not his voice, his touch.

"I'm here," he promises her, his hands slipping beneath her to heft her body up, easing her into the embrace of his scent, his warmth as he cradles her against him, scoops her from the floor. "I've got you."

Her head finds rest in the juncture between his neck and his shoulder, her body melting into the wall of his, and her eyes fall closed for a final time, but she holds tight to the fabric of his jacket, the reassurance of this reality, and give into the need for unconsciousness.

* * *

Blood, so much blood. The glitter of glass in her hair. He wants nothing more than to take her to a hospital, but after what the boys had told him… no, he had to take her somewhere safe, somewhere that she couldn't be found. No one knew to look at him, not after they had ended their partnership over a year ago, and that meant no one would think to consider Richard Castle taking an impromptu trip to his private beach house in the Hamptons as anything out of the ordinary.

It wasn't secure enough for his liking, but it would do as a temporary haven for now, until they could figure out a better game plan, a way to keep her safe, and alive.

"Castle?"

He jerks his head in her direction, dividing his gaze between Kate and the dark stretch of road ahead, but by the looks of it, the pale shade of her face and her bleary eyes, he may need to pull over soon.

"Hey, we're almost there," he murmurs, resisting the urge to reach over, squeeze her shoulder or her knee, do something to assure them both with his touch.

"Almost where?" she rasps, her eyes trailing slowly along the interior of the car before shifting back towards him with great effort. "How did you find me?"

"To the Hamptons, for now. At least until you're in better shape," he explains, giving into the need for her skin beneath his fingertips, grazing his hand over her knuckles for just a moment. But Kate turns her palm up, curls her fingers around his before he can withdraw his hand and return it to the steering wheel. "And Espo told me. We weren't sure which motel you'd gone to, so I just went to every one that seemed like a good hideout."

"You… you wanted to find me?" she mumbles, blinking against the obvious pull back towards unconsciousness, and Castle brushes his thumb along the inside of her wrist.

"I - we have so much to talk about, Kate. But I heard your last message and I knew you were in trouble."

"Didn't want to drag you into this," she sighs, her head drifting back to rest against the folded fabric of his coat against the passenger window. "I'm sorry, Castle. So sorry for everything-"

"Shh, not now," he murmurs, squeezing her limp fingers. "You didn't drag me into anything. I just reclaimed my job as your partner."

"You heard the last message," she breathes out, but her eyes have fallen shut and the rise and fall of her chest is beginning to slow into a steady pattern. "I meant it."

The swell of his chest crushes his lungs, slams his heart up against his ribs, and he has to force out a deep exhale to manage an even breath. Even after he had told her they were over, he had known it was a lie, that they could never be over. Even after nearly a year and a half apart, nothing had changed.

He had refused to admit it to himself, to accept it as true, but he had always known that sooner or later, they would come together in an inevitable collision. He just hadn't expected for it to be like this.

Castle sighs and gives her hand one final squeeze before carefully extricating his fingers and returning them to curl around the wheel. "Love you too, Kate."

* * *

The next time Kate's eyes slide open, daylight is breaking along the horizon and the car has come to a stop in a driveway she doesn't recognize.

"Kate?" his voice calls to her softly, his hand gentle at her shoulder. "Do you think you can walk?"

She winces at the mere thought, her head feeling like a thousand pound weight on her shoulders as she tries to ease her body into a sitting position, to meet Castle's eyes in the grey morning light, still not wholly convinced that all of this wasn't some sort of twisted nightmare.

"Here, why don't you try to eat a few of these first," Castle murmurs, reaching between them into a plastic bag and producing a sleeve of plain crackers, opening the pack, but her mouth feels like cotton, and the crackers would taste like dust on her tongue.

"Water first?" she croaks and he nods, drops the crackers to retrieve a bottle, aiding her clumsy fingers in curling around the plastic and holding on even as she lifts the top to her lips, manages a few sips. "Thank you."

"How bad is your head?" he inquires, placing the crackers in her lap and grazing his eyes along the matted hair atop her scalp, the clotted abrasions she can feel lining multiple pieces of her skull.

"It hurts," she whispers, barely able to speak past the sharp ache piercing throughout her head. "But it shouldn't be too bad. I think – think it's mostly the alcohol. They-"

"I saw what they did," he mutters, producing a packet of Tylenol, emptying the gas station brand bag on the console between them. "Also saw that they got what they deserved."

Kate accepts the two pills he hands her, downs them with another sip of the water and closes her eyes against the wave of nausea sweeping over her.

"Come on, Kate. You look like you need to lie down."

She wants to argue, tell him how desperately she needs to stay awake, to talk to him, but she nods instead, saves it for once they're safely inside his… mansion?

"Where are we again?" she asks once he's exited the driver's side and walked around to assist her in climbing out of the unfamiliar car without injuring herself further.

Castle hooks an arm around her waist, draws her body up from the passenger seat slowly and lets her lean against him while he shuts the door. "Hamptons."

"This is your house?" she whispers, feeling a quiet huff of amusement ruffle the hair clinging to her forehead. "Wow."

"I wish we were here under better circumstances, but I think you'll like it," he murmurs, guiding her towards the front porch and holding tightly to her body as they ascend the steps.

She wishes she could properly appreciate the entryway he leads her through, the magnificent interior of the beautiful house he navigates through with ease until they reach a door to what looks like one of many downstairs bedrooms.

"No, Castle, blood on the bed-"

"Least of my concerns." Castle practically drags her to the bed, her legs useless limbs that refuse to function, and helps control her descent to the soft sheets and fluffed pillows. "Just try to rest for a little while. When you wake up again, I'll have breakfast ready and we can discuss what we're going to do next-"

"Rick," she gets out, catching his wrist, gritting her teeth through the pulsing waves of the headache breaking against the wall of her skull and looking up to meet the worsening concern of his eyes. "Please don't leave."

It's wrong to ask anything of him, let alone something so… needy, something so unlike her, but it's been too long since she's seen him, since she's had something more than the pained echo of his voice in her ear, and he just saved her life. She doesn't want to let him go.

Castle sighs and she lets go of his hand, curls it into her chest and closes her eyes against the sight of him turning away. But then the mattress at her back is dipping, the warmth of his body is fitting against hers, and his arm is draping carefully over her waist.

"I wish I had called you back, listened to your messages sooner," he confesses, the spread of his hand over her stomach almost enough to distract her from the remorse in his voice.

She had suspected her messages had gone unheard, and it stings, but the hurt doesn't stick, dissipating before it can begin to linger.

Kate covers his hand, draws it up to her chest, to rest over her heart. "You listened to the most important one right on time."

"I should have picked up when you called-"

"No, Castle," she quiets him, shifting just enough so that her shoulder presses into his chest and she's allowed a glimpse of his stricken face. "I hurt you, I forced you to finally walk away. I didn't blame you for not answering."

"I was your partner. I shouldn't have just given up," he protests, using his unrestrained hand to brush some of the blood-dried hairs from her face.

"You didn't. You just took some time, like I did, remember?" she murmurs, lacing their fingers over her sternum.

"That was different," he sighs, but it wasn't, not in her mind. "You were shot in the chest, recovering from a-"

"And I broke your heart," Kate sighs, remembering all too clearly the look on his face during that last night in her apartment, the fight that finally broke him, how his eyes had beseeched her and all of his hope had crumbled as he told her he loved her for a final time. She remembers thinking in the back of her mind, that that was the look of heartbreak. "Not too different. The only person to blame here is me."

He shakes his head, but she silences him before he can speak his argument.

"I'm sorry, Castle. There's so much I have to say, that I want to say when I feel better than this, but you have to know that I'm truly sorry for hurting you."

His chest expands at her back, his heartbeat slamming against her shoulder blade, and she takes advantage of the hand twined with hers, brings his knuckles to her lips for a kiss before she can drift away again.

Castle touches his mouth to her temple and she thinks that it feels like silent forgiveness.

"Sleep, Kate. I'll be right here."

Beckett nods, her head giving into the softness of the pillow beneath, her body to the warmth of his surrounding her back, and the tentative, unfamiliar sensation of peace in her chest.


	3. Chapter 3

He's exhausted, but he can't sleep, partially afraid to even close his eyes, far more content to keep watch over Beckett, to gently comb the bits of glass from her hair and revel in the warmth of her body so close, the mere presence of her after too long without.

Castle stays with her for a little over an hour before carefully disentangling from the grasp of her hand, replacing his spot beside her with the cover of the comforter and an extra pillow, and devotes the rest of his time to cooking her a good meal. It looks like it's been awhile since she's eaten well.

Ryan and Esposito call him on the burner phone he had bought at the gas station on the drive to the Hamptons and he updates them on the situation, reassuring them of Beckett's safety and requesting input on what to do next.

"Just stay put for now, bro," Esposito murmurs, his voice hushed. "IA is chasing their tails trying to find her and-"

"And Bracken's men?"

"We headed to the motel room this morning, but all the evidence is-"

"Gone," Castle supplies with a sigh.

"Don't worry, Castle. We're handling things here. Just keep this line open and stick with Beckett," Ryan instructs, reassuring but strained.

"Yeah, we're gonna figure this out," Esposito promises. "We always do."

"And on a positive note, look at how this has brought the team back together again," Ryan tries, earning a mutter of irritation from Esposito and a punch to the shoulder from the sounds of it. "We'll talk to you soon, Castle. Call us if anything comes up."

"Will do, thanks guys."

Castle sets the device back down onto the kitchen counter, finishes serving up the last of the pancakes onto the brightly colored plates. He has faith in the boys, but he also knows what they're up against, that a dragon cannot be so easily slain. But he isn't worried.

The car is packed with two go bags and filled with enough gas to cross the border into Canada, and with Kate's life at risk, he won't hesitate to drive until the danger is far behind them.

"Castle?"

Rick glances up to find Kate approaching, her gait slow, a bit pained, but she's steady on her feet and her eyes are clear when he looks up to meet them.

"Hey," he greets, plastering on his best attempt at a smile for her, but the flicker of worry in her eyes assures him it was a failure. "How are you feeling?"

"Not the best," she admits, gripping the granite edge of the countertop once she's close enough. "But better. I don't think the head wounds are as bad as they feel."

"We still need to clean them up, pick all of the glass out," he reminds her softly, training his eyes on the top of her hair, the streaks of red smeared through the honey brown.

Kate winces at the mention of it, but nods her agreement. "In the meantime, though, I was hoping we could talk?"

"Yeah, of course," he murmurs, but his stomach clenches, nerves twisting up his gut. "We can eat at the same time, if you want."

Her gaze shift from his face to the buffet he's turned the kitchen island into, rippling with surprise at the small selection of breakfast foods. He hasn't been here for a few months, hadn't had the chance to stock the fridge or the pantry, but he'd had enough for pancakes, for eggs and bacon, and some fresh fruits that the house cleaner often leaves just in case.

"You didn't have to-"

"Wanted to." Castle hands her a full plate, grabs one for himself and nods towards the dining room table before thinking better of it, noticing the windows, and directing her towards the bar instead.

He waits until Kate is seated atop the barstool to climb onto the one beside her, handing her a fork and a knife, but she picks at her food, biting on her bottom lip while he forces himself to swallow down a few bites of his breakfast.

"I don't know where to start," she whispers, spearing a piece of pancake with her fork, her expression thoughtful as she chews.

"The beginning," he prompts, part of him afraid of what's to come with her explanation, but needing it nonetheless. If there is even a chance of repairing the battered, broken down thing between them, he needs her side of the story first. "Just start at the beginning."

She nods, takes a sip from the glass of water next to her plate. "The day after we – after our last fight, I ended up on a roof with the guy who shot me."

Castle chokes on his eggs, sputtering around a drink of his water to wash them down. " _What_?"

"Espo and I had been running down a lead and it led us to him," she explains, her gaze on her plate, the travel of her fork through the assortment of diced fruit. "I chased Maddox up to the roof and I - I was no match for him." Her head shakes and he can see the tension climbing the ladder of her spine beneath the grey material of the oversized hoodie she still wears. "I almost died and… and all I could think about was you. I just wanted you and the second they pulled me up, I-"

"Pulled you up?" he echoes, not intending to interrupt, but the idea of her almost dying without him around to rescue her has his mind spiraling towards all kinds of horrific scenarios.

Kate sucks in a shallow breath. "From the ledge of a building. I was hanging by my fingers and Ryan pulled me up before I could fall. And after that, when we were back at the Twelfth, I resigned." She had _resigned_? The boys had never mentioned that. "Then I went to the loft and-"

"I wasn't there," he mumbles the memory of that night, how he had spent it alone on the couch in his office at the Old Haunt. While Kate Beckett had been at his doorstep.

"That was the first night I called you," she nods, collecting another piece of her pancake with her fork, but failing to lift it to her lips. "I kept calling you because I just knew that when I stopped, when I truly accepted that you weren't going to answer, that we really were over and I couldn't – I didn't want to believe that."

"We were never over," Castle murmurs, forcing his gaze up from his plate. "I never answered, but I never stopped wanting to. I tried to tell myself that I wanted you to stop calling, that it would be better to have a clean break, to just move on. But every time your name showed up on my phone… it made me feel hopeful," he confesses, all of it tumbling out too quickly, but he knows that she's caught every word. That she understands better than anyone else could. "I never wanted to give up, Kate. I just thought it was the right thing for both of us."

"I wish it would have been, for you," she whispers, causing his brow to furrow with incomprehension. "I hated the idea of you moving on, but if you would have been happy, safer than you are now, then-"

"Kate," he sighs, slipping from the barstool to step towards her, close enough to touch his hand to the curved bow of her spine, soothe the rigid set of her shoulders. "I was miserable."

A strangled laugh pries past her lips. "Me too. You're a difficult person to miss, Castle."

"You're not so easy either," he huffs, a grin cracking open the corners of his mouth when she abandons her breakfast to smile back at him. "Especially after that last voicemail."

The stretch of her lips shrinks, turns shy, uncertain. "Castle-"

"I was going to call you back, finally call you back, until I heard the entirety of it. But I had hoped to see you, so I guess it worked out after all," he muses, retracting his hand from her back as she shifts to turn towards him.

He had hoped for a smile, wry amusement, but her eyes are searching his face, a troubled, imploring brown color that has him reaching for her cheek, watching them widen at the cup of his palm to the slash of bone.

"Castle, what I said…" she murmurs, covering the fingers cradling her skin, smearing a kiss to the heel of his hand that makes his heart skip before drawing it down to rest with hers atop her thigh as she takes a deep breath. "I don't know what's going to happen, and I'm not saying this under the best of circumstances-"

"Kate, you don't-"

She silences him with the curl of her fingers at his nape, gentle but demanding, coaxing him in closer. Her knees part at the bump of his abdomen, blooming open to welcome the width of his hips, the advantage of the stool placing his torso between her legs.

"I love you," she breathes, squeezing his hand and brushing her thumb along the back of his neck. "And I'm sorry for everything, but if we make it out of this-"

It's his turn to quiet her, to use his touch to silence her words. Castle leans into the soft pressure of her hand, close enough to merely tilt forward, press a kiss to her mouth that has her entire body going stiff. Her breath stutters against his lips before she kisses him back, lifting into the fit of his mouth so tender and careful, the opposite of their first encounter of lips and teeth and tongues. So much better. He dedicates his hands to scaling up her thighs, over the bones of her hips and along her sides, migrating to span at her back as her mouth grows braver, her tongue stroking along the seam of his lips, slipping inside and stealing his breath.

"Castle," she gasps, lacing her arms around his neck, and – and oh, she's wrapping her legs around his waist too, coaxing their hips to clash and sealing her chest to his.

"We're making it out of this," he mumbles, smudging another kiss to her mouth before he dips lower to suckle on the skin beneath her jaw, the flesh covering the glorious throb of her pulse. Kate buries her fingers in his hair, releases a whimpering noise against the skin of his cheek, and he clutches her hips, drags her body off of the stool and into his arms. "We're making it out of this together, Kate. Because no way am I giving you up now."

* * *

She registers that Castle is carrying her, taking the path back towards the bedroom she had spent the morning in, and her body exalts at the revelation, arching against him as he grazes his teeth along the column of her throat.

Her hips rock, her body rolling into his before she can even think to control herself, and Castle stumbles, pressing her back into the white framing of the doorway, knocking his forehead into her jaw and attempting to catch his breath. Kate combs her fingers through his hair, focuses on the deafening pummel of her heart against the bones of her ribs, pounding through her ears and threatening to break her chest open.

"Okay?" he murmurs, his voice soft, a gentle rumble against her jaw, and Kate tightens her legs around him, feels his body shiver in response.

"Yeah, better than."

His ribcage expands, the broad wall of his chest crushing against hers, and Beckett hums in approval of the pressure, dusting her lips along the curve of his eyebrow. Rick gathers himself, eases back from the wall and into the bedroom, lifting his mouth back to hers when she tugs.

But it isn't the soft surface of a mattress beneath her when Castle slows to a stop and lowers her down, onto the hard marble of the adjoining bathroom's vanity.

Kate's eyes flutter open in confusion, her fingers curling at his ears in askance.

"I need to look at your head," he murmurs, his hand sliding down her back and she sighs in disappointment, but can't deny that she's grateful. There is nothing she wants more than to fall into bed with him, to map every inch of his skin with her hands, her mouth, to finally give him every piece of herself that she had once held back, but he was right – she's still suffering from a severe head wound, still has dried blood staining her hair and her clothes, and despite their talk during their hardly touched breakfast, she could still taste the heartache on his tongue.

"I'll pick out the glass first, then you can have a bath in my luxurious master bathroom upstairs," Castle promises, opening one of the top drawers and retrieving a pair of tweezers.

Kate shudders out a breath, but nods her assent.

"You may not love me much after this," he chuckles, trying so hard to add some levity to the situation, but the apprehension is alive in his eyes, straining along his lips, and she cups his face in her hands, seals a chaste kiss to his mouth.

"Nothing's going to stop me from loving you, Castle. Don't worry."

She doesn't think she will ever get used to the bright blue of wonder that blooms through his eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

His heart twisted through every cringe, gasp, and quiet moan of pain she had unwillingly emitted while he'd extracted the glass embedded into her scalp. But tending to her injuries was worth the crescent shaped marks he's almost certain adorn his hips, where he had allowed her to grip his bones through the agony.

It could have been worse. The shards of glass had been small but visible, easy for him to locate amidst the strands of her hair and remove from her skin without trouble. The process had taken him a near fifteen minutes, but her wounds were clean, the bleeding had stopped, and now he's running Kate Beckett a bath in his Jacuzzi tub, filling it will lavender scented bubble bath and some Epsom salt.

He's still having a hard time believing that she's here, that all of this is real, that he had kissed her, felt her body arching for more against his. He'd almost missed out on all of it, almost lost her completely-

"It's really beautiful here," Kate murmurs, entering the bathroom with eyes that are bloodshot but soft when they reach him. "I wish we had time to go down to the beach."

"Why wouldn't we be able to go down to the beach?" he asks, dipping his fingers into the sudsy water as steam begins to rise. Hot but not scalding, a perfect temperature for her to lounge in. "We have the time. Until Ryan and Esposito call with an update, that is."

She doesn't answer him, her gaze falling to the tiled flooring, and Castle sighs, winces through the pop of his knees as he rises from the side of the tub.

"Kate, we're not running from this, you know that, right?" he inquires, cupping her shoulder in his palm, stroking his thumb along the harsh bone that he can so easily locate through the thin fabric of her t-shirt. He should go reheat her pancakes, see if he can feed them to her while she's unwinding in his tub. "But you almost died less than twelve hours ago. We can't take on Bracken like this."

"I didn't want you to be a part of this," she mumbles, shaking her head, but Castle stills her, curves his fingers along the back of her neck.

"I was the one who started all of this, remember?" he states, the ugly truth of it all, but Kate's brow furrows and Castle lets her go, starts back towards the filling tub. "I'm the one who started digging into your mom's case even after you _told_ me what it would do. I'm the one who dragged you back into it. I made myself a part of it from the beginning."

"It would have happened with or without you," she reasons, the quiet sound of her bare feet on the cool tile coming towards him. "Dick Coonan still would have shown up. The truth of what Montgomery did would have eventually come out. You aren't responsible for any of this, Castle. If anything, you just made it more bearable." She's said words to him like that before – _you make my job a little more fun –_ but he still glances back to her in surprise. "I always thought that I had to do this alone, that it could only be me, but having you as my partner… I wouldn't have made it this far without you."

"Kate, I've been - I haven't been your partner for over a year. I left you to do this on your own," he argues, the image of her face on his phone screen flashing through his mind, the guilt he had put off for the last year overflowing, beginning to choke him.

He feels her presence at his back, like a magnet, the electric charge of her crackling along his spine before she's even touched him. "It took hanging off the side of a building, believing it was the end for me to see that there was more to my life than my mother's case. To finally realize that I wanted more. But prior to that, I - I was intent on dying for my cause."

Castle cuts his eyes to her over his shoulder, to witness the small smile on her lips, the echo of his words in her mouth.

"You walked out on me because I gave you no choice." His mouth opens with another protest, but Kate silences him, hushes him with the brush of her thumb to his lips. "We can discuss this as much as you want, Rick, but I don't want to dwell on it. It's the past now."

She's right, he knows that, and it makes him proud of her, to experience this newfound ability to let go of the past instead of allowing it to consume her future.

Castle is careful when he leans in, presses a kiss to an unscathed place atop her head. "You're right. I'm with you now, Beckett. No more going up against this thing on your own. "

"Okay," she exhales, not exactly thrilled with his determination, but accepting of it, and that's all he needs.

The water is rising to the top of the bathtub and Castle squeezes her shoulder before he bends forward to turn the faucet off and ensure that the jets along the sides of the tub are set to the right speed.

"Now, I know we washed the blood out of your hair downstairs, but if you want me to go through it again, I can. Otherwise…" Castle turns back to tell her he'd be right in the next room if she needed anything, but his words dissipate on his tongue, his mind going blank as he catches sight of Kate shimmying out of her pants, kicking them towards the t-shirt pooled on the floor near her feet. "Um." Oh, Kate Beckett in a black bra, underwear, and nothing else is enough to leave him speechless for a while. "I'll just-"

She glances up, quirks an eyebrow at him, takes a step towards him, and Rick nearly stumbles back, falls into the giant bathtub.

"You're right, it's definitely a master bathtub," Kate assesses, lowering her eyes to the large pool of steaming water and the mass of bubbles floating along the surface. "Big enough for two."

"Well, yes, but I don't-" She reaches behind her, unclasps the fastening of her bra, but Castle stops her before the lingerie can fall, covers the bare skin of her arms with his palms. "Kate."

"Not going to join me?" she murmurs, rolling her shoulder beneath the weight of his hand, causing one of the satin straps to slip downwards, hooking in his thumb.

He can't help caressing the naked curve of her shoulder, closing his eyes as she sways into him, so gentle but determined, all too alluring. Kate arches on the tips of her toes, their noses bumping before her lips dust along his, offering the chance to pull away if he needs it. But his arms manage to wind around her waist before his mind can have a say in the action, his hands gliding up the smooth skin of her back, desperate to memorize every dip of flesh and rise of bone, the heat of her beneath his palms.

The soft cotton of her bra lands at his feet, her breasts flush against his chest as she coils her arms around his neck.

"Maybe a bath wouldn't be so bad," he reasons, sucking her upturned bottom lip into his mouth, laving it with his tongue just to hear the titillating sound of her moan.

He squeezes her hips before he gently draws her away, murmuring into her cheek about the water growing cold while he begins to undo the buttons of his own shirt, his fingers fumbling down the line as he watches her remove her underwear and dip her toes into the hot water.

Castle listens to the ripple of water as she sinks into the tub, but his back remains turned while he finishes undressing, the sensation of Kate's eyes roaming over each newly bared part of him reoccurring.

"Thought staring was creepy," he mumbles, keeping his eyes on the water and the islands of bubbles atop the surface, the space left behind her for him to settle in.

"Mm, couldn't resist," she answers, no shame in her voice as she glances over her shoulder, unabashedly raking her eyes along his chest once he's sitting at her back, breathing a sigh of contentment at the jets that immediately soothe the tense muscles crowding along his spine.

Castle relaxes back into the curve of the tub, holds his breath when Kate follows his descent, suppresses the wholly inappropriate moan that swells in his throat when she rests her back to his chest, tucks her head beneath his chin.

"Breathe, Castle," she reminds him, amusement trickling through her tone, but it's affectionate. _She's_ affectionate, far more than he would have ever expected, and Kate finds his uncertain hands in the water, guides them to tangle around her midsection and hums against him in contentment.

But he can't seem to relax, to silence the clashing of surprise and delight and apprehension all rioting through his brain, and he knows she can hear the uproar as she combs her nails along the hair decorating his forearm.

"You know I like to read in the bath, don't you?" she asks, the question throwing him off his hectic train of thought, but he nods from behind her.

"You mentioned it once, I think. Either that, or I just assumed, since I know your character so well."

Kate scoffs, but she's smiling, the rise of her cheeks visible and lovely. "It was always something I looked forward to, especially after a long day at the precinct or a stressful case. And it's something I never would have considered sharing with anyone else. That was my time to relax, let the hot water work out some of the built up tension in my muscles, get lost in a book."

"Preferably, my books."

"Mm, sometimes," she reveals, laughing at his gasp of surprise.

"I'm so glad you're telling me this story while I'm actually in a bath with you, makes it far more enjoyable," Castle grins, growing a little bolder and splaying his hands over the naked plane of her abdomen, feeling the taut muscles beneath his palms jump and contract.

"The point," she mumbles, allowing his hands to wander, to send her muscles rippling and goosebumps up the exposed pieces of her arms. "I thought about this, about – about what it could be like to just come home with you, draw a bath like always but with you there, just like this."

His hands have gone still, every sliver of hesitance that had resided within his body having disappeared, drained into the water surrounding them, just as she'd intended by telling him this little story, by reminding him, proving that he had never been as alone and in love with her as he had once thought.

"Does this live up to those expectations?" he murmurs, a grin spilling across his lips when Kate leans her head back against his shoulder, smears a kiss to his neck.

"You have no idea," she mumbles, submerging her hands beneath the water to traverse along the outsides of the thighs cradling her, trailing her fingertips over his skin.

"Oh, I got a decent one earlier, in the kitchen, against the door-"

"Castle," she huffs, nipping at his jawline, and he ducks his head to avoid the pleasant burn of her mouth before this turns into more than a relaxing bath. "That was nothing compared to what I want to do to you."

"Kate," he groans, dropping his forehead to the slick skin of her shoulder and snatching her hands from his thighs, trapping them beneath his at her chest.

She goes very still for a moment, though, and Castle lifts his head in question, finds his answer in the wiggle of her fingers beneath his, their left hands right over her heart and the bullet that scars it. A scar he's never actually seen.

"I know it's… I hate it, but it's fading well, almost unnoticeable," she explains and he doesn't understand why she's suddenly so stiff and self-conscious in his arms, why she would think – _oh_. Oh no, she thinks her scar will upset him? "I wish you could have seen before I-"

"Kate," he admonishes softly, retracting her hand from the spot between her breasts, catching a glimpse of the raised flesh that is almost easy to miss, fading into a subtle white against her olive skin. "Turn around."

She hesitates, guiding his hands down her sides as she sits forward, intentionally drawing his fingers along the incision scar beneath the bottom rung of her ribcage, not visible to him beneath the bubbles, but he's always known of its existence.

Kate shifts away from him in the water, readjusts herself to face him, and he reaches for her, the tightness that had begun to form in his chest loosening when she comes without resistance. Having a serious conversation in a bubble bath with Kate wrapped around him, certainly able to feel his want for her between them, probably isn't the most ideal way to do this, but he craves the contact, already addicted to it after a mere few hours.

"You're beautiful," he murmurs, finding her hands in the water to restrict them from rising to cover her chest. "You have to know that."

"I hated looking at them," she deflects, her lashes hiding her eyes, but Kate lifts one of her hands from the water, splays it over his chest. "Still do most of the time."

"I don't," he states, caressing the marred skin along her side, tracing the lattice of her ribs that expand beneath his touch. "They're a part of you, Kate. But they aren't everything, they don't make you any less breathtaking."

His fingertips skim the underside of her breast and she shudders, catches his hand and drags the pads of his fingers up to the round scar in the middle of her sternum, the memories of how she had earned it still so vivid and clear, so devastating.

Castle slips his fingers free from beneath the cove of her hand, leans forward to replace them with the press of his lips to her scar, bracketing her waist with his hands when she bows over him.

He draws back as her heart begins to quicken, as her fingers clench in his hair, and it takes every ounce of willpower he possesses not to touch his mouth to the perfect slopes of her breasts so bare and inviting before him, to wait.

"Staying in this tub much longer is probably not a good idea," he decides, grinning at the breathless laugh she releases.

"No, probably not," she agrees, but before he can offer to grab them both towels, Kate curls forward, slips her arms around his neck and releases a sigh against his chest.

He doesn't question it, never would, and cradles her there against him, places his hands to her shoulder blades and feels her heart slow, evening out beneath his palms.

"Thank you, Castle."

His response is instantaneous, a word that has always been reserved only for her and no longer tastes like acid in his mouth once he speaks it.

"Always."


	5. Chapter 5

Kate pulls one of his t-shirts over her head and steps into the sweatpants he had offered her from the bottom drawer of his dresser, the smallest pair he could find. Everything was too big, but she doesn't mind, the embrace of his scent a comforting consolation while her clothes are undergoing a cycle in his washing machine.

"Hey, I just heard from the boys," Castle informs her, bounding into the closet where she had been getting dressed. "Well, they texted me."

He holds out the phone to her and she accepts the device with nervous fingers, reads the update Ryan and Esposito sent to him.

 _Nothing yet. You can probably count on staying put for the rest of today, but keep the phone on you._

Beckett sighs, hands the burner back to Castle.

"They're going to find something, Kate. They will. It hasn't even been 24 hours yet," he reasons, shoving the phone into the pocket of his jeans and she wants to believe him, but she knows Bracken, knows how slim the chances are of her boys finding anything to prove him guilty of his endless list of crimes. Not before Bracken finds her.

"Ryan and Espo told me you had to go into hiding for a few days anyway, until the heat from IA died down, right?" Castle murmurs when she fails to offer up a response. "This is the same plan, just a different location."

Well, he wasn't wrong.

"You're right, I just wish this was over," she confesses, attempting to lift her lips when he steps deeper into the closet. "I wish we could have done this right, you know? Without this case looming over our heads."

"There's no right or wrong way to do this," he argues, stealing one of her hands from her sides and reeling her in without even a tug of effort. "Having Bracken out to kill you will never be an ideal scenario, but this, us? Nothing can tarnish that."

Kate sways into him, hooks an arm around his waist and rests her forehead to his shoulder. She's never been the one who is good with words, but he says it all anyway, always knows exactly what she needs to hear to make it all right.

"Speaking of heads, how is yours?" he asks, chuckling when she sighs her annoyance into his collarbone.

"Better now. You make a pretty good medic, Castle."

"Alexis broke a glass once when she was eight, stepped right into in her haste to clean it up. She hadn't been wearing shoes."

Kate cringes against him. "Oh no."

"There had to be a hundred tiny bits of glass embedded into the bottom of her foot. It took over an hour, but I was able to remove every piece, piggybacked her around the loft for the next week," he recalls, the smile evident in his voice, and Kate lifts her head to see it on his face.

"How is Alexis?" she inquires, realizing with a bloom of horror in her chest that she had never even thought to ask about his daughter since they had arrived. "Is she – does she know you're with me?"

Castle sweeps a hand down her spine to calm the anxiety she's certain he can feel clamoring through her frame, but it does nothing to soothe the truth of how she knows Alexis feels about her. Well, how she had once felt about her. By now, Kate's sure the girl's loathing has increased, doubled.

"Alexis is fine. She's across the country right now, attending her second year at Stanford. So no, she isn't aware of what I did, but she is aware that I never quite got over you. I don't think any of this will surprise her."

"That doesn't mean she'll be okay with it," she points out, her voice quiet, subdued.

She had already wrecked his life enough as it was, to cause a rift between him and his daughter is unthinkable.

"Especially when I'm putting you at such a risk, Rick."

He clutches at her when she shifts to be free from his arms, move past him and out of the closet, his brow creasing with question, but his eyes are already flooding with despair.

"Castle, I love you," she breathes before he can offer up a protest, her fingers ascending to his brow to smooth it out. "But maybe we should wait until everything blows over to-"

"No," he murmurs, the frown already carving itself into his lips. "We've done enough waiting, wasted enough time. If it's Alexis you're worried about, don't."

"Rick, you can't just-"

"I'm not saying it will be easy," he placates, both of them knowing it will be the exact opposite. "But I do know my daughter, and no matter her initial reaction, she will eventually be okay with this, with us." Castle curls his fingers around her wrist. "I'm not willing to sacrifice any more time with you, Kate."

The instinct to argue with him flares in the back of her mind, to stack against him all of the reasons why this is a bad idea, but he was right. They had already wasted too much time apart, separated by pride and heartache, and she was done harboring the yearning for him that had carved out a hollow spot within her chest that only the voicemail of his phone could ever even attempt to fill until now.

"Then don't," she decides, resolution simmering through her veins, reflecting in his eyes. "I don't want you to either."

"I won't," he promises, holds her just a little tighter before he disbands his arms from around her waist, guides her out of the closet. "While we're here though, I should probably run into town, get us some food."

Kate nods, even as her stomach clenches with the irrational fear of being left alone again. "Does the house have an alarm system?"

"The absolute best," he assures her, leading her out of the bedroom and down the stairs. He shows her the panel in the main hallway, the other by the front door, explains how everything works, but it does little to quell her trepidation. A mansion was not an easy place to defend, not that she had done much better in the compact space of a cheap motel room. "Oh, and I got this for you at the gas station last night," he murmurs, trotting into the living room, where a matching burner phone sits on the coffee table.

Kate presses the iPhone's home button once he hands it to her, watches the screen come to life in her palm.

"I set it up while you were sleeping. I'm the only contact stored, since I thought it would be best just to have that one for situations like this, keep the other for Ryan and Esposito. Though, I may have to use it to contact my mother since I didn't necessarily explain why I had to disappear three days ago…"

Kate jerks her gaze up to see him already raising a hand to her in supplication. "Castle-"

"My mother will understand without a doubt, Kate. Don't worry about that," he murmurs, drifting towards the front entrance and snagging the car keys, a baseball cap and a jacket that makes him look thicker, bulkier, disguising his frame.

"You actually know what you're doing," she realizes aloud, earning a soft huff of laughter from him as he adjusts the hat.

"Chalk it up to a lot of research and always wanting to be prepared. I'd be just as ready for the zombie apocalypse," he says proudly and her lips crack with a smile before he sobers, turns to her in the foyer with concern lining his pupils. "You'll be okay here by yourself?"

"Of course, Castle," she mumbles, but she does sway towards him before he can unlock the door, presses a bruising kiss to his mouth that makes him drop his keys.

"Beckett," he growls, branding the bones of her hips with the grip of his hands. "Don't kiss me like you won't be here when I get back."

"I'm not," she lies, arching on her toes to paint a gentle stroke of her lips to his this time, touching her tongue to the corner of his mouth and descending back down to the soles of her feet when he moans. "I'll be here."

"Don't hesitate to call me, for anything. And if for any reason you need it, there's a safe in my room, below the fireplace where one of the wood panels is loose. Code is 41319."

Her jaw drops, but Castle is already slipping out the door.

* * *

She doesn't need the gun.

Alone in a giant house unarmed leaves her feeling vulnerable, but she'll be fine. No one knows where they are, that there is a _they_ at all. As far as Bracken knew, her communication with Castle has been nonexistent for the last year, and the boys were keeping them updated on the progress of Internal Affairs' team.

Nothing was going to happen in the hour that he was gone to the grocery store.

That didn't stop her from jumping at every small sound that filled the house – the hum of the central air kicking in, the rumble of the dryer her clothes were in, the creak of a stair beneath her weight when she contemplates returning to his bedroom.

Kate curses herself, going crazy after only fifteen minutes alone, and strides into his kitchen with determination, snags a knife from the cutlery drawer, and heads for the french doors that lead out onto the beach.

The scent of salt in the air is a comfort, the crash of waves to the shore drowning out the swell of paranoia through her mind, and she sucks in a breath of relief as the panic recedes. But even as she ventures further down the beach, her grip on the knife fails to loosen.

* * *

The second he steps inside the house, he can tell that it's empty, that the alarm has been disarmed, and he immediately drops the groceries onto the kitchen counter, calls the phone he had left with her.

It only has to ring once.

"I'm right outside," the soft reassurance of Kate's voice promises him and he sighs in relief, follows the path he assumes she took through the double doors just off the dining area, sure enough finding footprints in the sand just off the patio.

And not far, the huddled figure of her near the water, sitting with her knees curled to her chest in the afternoon sunlight.

"I see you."

Kate glances over her shoulder, the phone still pressed to her ear, and smiles back at him.

"Join me for a few minutes?"

Castle pockets the phone, already nodding his agreement as he trots down the path she's created, eventually making his way to the warm sand beside her and folding his legs beneath him. The air is cool today, the water likely freezing, the hints of summertime heat only beginning to spill into the atmosphere, and he settles in close against Beckett's side.

"Did it go okay?" she inquires, flickering her eyes up to assess him.

"Yep, I bought enough for a fulfilling lunch, a gourmet dinner, and a buffet breakfast. And some snacks," he lists with pride. "And I saw absolutely nothing out of the ordinary, so I think it's safe to say we're still in the clear."

"For now," she adds on a sigh that sounds so exhausted, it has him wishing he could scoop her up from the sand, carry her to bed and let her sleep the rest of the day away.

"For now," he confirms, turning his head to brush a kiss to her hair, avoiding the sensitive, sill healing places decorating her scalp. "No more worrying for now."

Kate leans into him, humming her acknowledgement, but her gaze remains on the phone cradled in her hands.

"Something wrong with the phone?" he inquires, tilting his head in curiosity, but hers only shakes, a shy smile on her lips.

"No, it's - it's nothing, stupid-"

"Oh please," he huffs. "Nothing you say is ever stupid."

She rolls her eyes, grazes her thumb along the exterior of the iPhone before tucking it back into the pocket of his sweatpants she wears. "Just talking to you on the phone. Felt surreal, I guess."

There's nothing he can say to that, she's already told him not to apologize, but imagining her on the other end of all of those phone calls he actively ignored has his heart in an iron fist.

"Not trying to make you feel guilty, Castle," she murmurs, nudging him with her elbow and unfurling her legs to stretch out in front of her.

"It's going to take a while for me _not_ to feel guilty," he mutters, watching the waves rush against the shoreline, surge forward to meet them but reaching just shy of Kate's bare feet.

"It doesn't matter anymore, know why?" Castle glances sideways to her in question, but she's already rising from the sand, holding her hand out for him to follow. He clasps her wiggling fingers, allows her to tug him upwards and start back towards the house. "Because I know now that if I call, you'll answer."

He nods. "I will."

"And if you don't, hopefully you'll at least have a better voicemail greeting for me to listen to."

"Hey, there was nothing wrong with my current voicemail greeting."

Kate scoffs and releases his hand to open one of the doors. "You sound miserable. It's depressing."

"Beckett, I was _brooding_ ," he defends, locking the door behind him once they're both safely inside. "I think I was entitled to a solemn voicemail greeting."

Her lips quirk, but the glimpse of her smile is quickly outshined by the knife she slides from within the sleeve of her shirt, depositing it back into the drawer it came from.

"Just in case," she murmurs when she notices his arched eyebrow. "I tried staying inside, but it was too… I was getting paranoid. Being on the beach kept me calm."

"I'm glad I called and didn't try sneaking up on you."

"Would've heard you the second you stepped out of the house," Kate assures him, nodding her head to the assembly of groceries overtaking the island, the countertops. "Want help preparing lunch?"

His lips quirk, a comment about enjoying the domesticity of cooking lunch together on his tongue that he bites back. Too soon for that.

It's hardly been 24 hours since he found her in the hotel hallway, carried her to the nondescript car the old friend he had gained through research for his Storm novels had given him, no questions asked, and drove her out of the city. It's hardly been 24 hours, but it feels like more, feels like so much progress has been made between the two of them, but this is still Kate Beckett, the woman whose walls became too tall for him to climb, who crushed his heart in her hand and made his love feel worthless.

He wants to love her without hesitation, to trust her wholeheartedly, but they both need more time. The lack of a threat on her life would also be preferable.

"Sure, I was thinking grilled chicken. Shouldn't take long," he answers, unpacking the meat from the grocery bag, laying out the fresh vegetables in the sink.

Kate steps up beside him, rinses the head of lettuce beneath the faucet while he removes the chicken from its packaging, their hips bumping while they work together. And he doesn't say a word, but there's a soft smile on her lips that he can't help sharing.


	6. Chapter 6

Kate falls asleep after their lunch of grilled chicken sandwiches and the salad she had constructed on her own of the ingredients he had provided, curled up on the sofa with a movie neither of them had been paying much attention to still playing on the television. Castle covers her with a throw blanket, lets her rest while he calls his mother from the other room, placating her worries with a calm explanation of all that has happened.

"This is absolutely disastrous, for both of you. I can't even imagine how Katherine must be feeling," his mother had exclaimed, true concern for Kate in her words.

His mother knew how badly Beckett had wounded him, had informed him more than once that she wasn't necessarily his former partner's biggest fan, but Martha still cared about the woman he loved, had kept hoping they would somehow painlessly find their way back to each other. And they had, minus the 'painless' part, of course.

"She's holding up," Castle had sighed, retrieving Kate's shirt and jeans from the dryer while he talked with his mother, folding them atop the machine. "Much better than I had expected, honestly."

"And how are you doing, kiddo? Aside from the fact that you're currently in hiding and potential danger, is everything alright?"

"With Kate, you mean?"

"She is part of the all encompassing term of 'everything'," Martha had drawled and he had rolled his eyes, but the smile still crept across his lips.

"Good," he'd confessed, leaning back against the washer. "We're really good."

"Oh, Richard," his mother had gushed, genuine relief flooding through the speaker of the phone. "That's marvelous to hear. I just knew you two would work things out and I'm so utterly thrilled-"

"I am too, Mother, and I'd love to talk with you more about it, but for now, I need to keep this line clear and we probably shouldn't stay connected for too long anyway."

"Oh yes, darling, of course. I'll let you go, but don't hesitate to call if there's anything I can do."

"For now, just look out for Alexis, try to keep her away from this for as long as you can," he had sighed. He hadn't spoken to his daughter all week, which wasn't an uncommon occurrence these days. He was still close with Alexis, but there was a distance that had grown between them, a kind that had nothing to do with her living across the country. "And Mother, I love you."

"I love you too, kiddo. Stay safe. Both of you."

"We will," he had promised her, still refusing to believe otherwise. He and Kate were going to make it through this, one way or another. They had endured too much not to. And in comparison to past situations they've been in, this was really nothing.

They had survived nearly freezing to death, bullet wounds, bank explosions – a Senator and his goons were a mediocre threat in the grand scheme of things. At least, that's what he's going to continue telling himself.

Kate sleeps for hours, just as he had suspected she might, and doesn't wake from her dozing until the sun has set, replaced by the glow of the moon, and he's cooking dinner, the lasagna in the oven nearly finished.

"You should have woken me sooner," she rasps at his back, shuffling into the kitchen and lacing her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek to the blade of his shoulder as if it's the most natural thing in the world.

It still takes him by surprise, all of the touching, how effortless it is for her when before all of this, he was lucky just to hold her hand. Castle squeezes one of those hands bridged over his abdomen, caressing the slim bones of her fingers.

"You needed the rest. You're still recovering from a severe head injury," he reminds her, practically feeling her eyes roll from behind him. "And you hardly got any actual sleep last night."

"I got enough on the ride up here, this morning too," she points out, smirking against the back of his neck when he shivers at the kiss of her lips there.

"Must you do that while I'm working with a hot stove?"

"What's the matter, Castle? Can't handle the heat?" she teases, releasing him before he can turn around, forget about dinner altogether. "You cool down, I'll set out places."

He listens to her chuckle as she drifts off towards the dining table with their plates, the silverware, and for a second, he can imagine this is all part of their normal. He can pretend they're just here on vacation, taking a weekend away from the city to have some time to themselves on the beach. Not running for their lives from people who want her dead or incarcerated.

"Castle?" she calls, concern lacing through her voice as she notices him staring at her, still in his clothes and with her hair tied back into a loose ponytail at her nape. "You okay?"

"Yeah, fine, just wish I had brought you here sooner is all," he admits, and it's true. He wishes he would have swallowed down his pride, gotten over being hurt a long time ago. Maybe if he had, this past year could have been spent together, falling deeper in love with her and bringing her up to the Hamptons for summer getaways.

Instead, he had wallowed through it in misery, drifting from his daughter, shutting out his mother, and burying himself in book tours that left him with aching cheeks from all the smiles he had to fake.

"I'm here now," Kate reminds him, her smile timid but hopeful. "And once this is all over with, we'll come here again, thoroughly make up for lost time."

His returning smile is genuine. "I look forward to it. Especially since a year is quite a lot to make up for-"

"A single year? I was thinking at least several," she quips, biting the tender flesh of her bottom lip.

"Several?" he echoes, his eyebrows arching up towards his hairline, but Kate keeps her gaze to the table that she's taking her time arranging the two sets of silverware on.

"I'd say since the first time you initially asked me to come here with you," she nods, fiddling with a fork and Castle turns off the oven, approaches her with too many questions bubbling against the barrier of his lips.

"What are you talking about? You - you told me no back then. You were with Demming, remember?"

"Yeah, it was my fault. I waited too long to tell you," she replies, worsening the state of his confusion, but she doesn't make him wonder long, abandoning her fidgeting with the dishes to curl her fingers around the top of a chair instead. "I broke it off with Demming that day you had planned to leave. During your going away party, I asked you to step outside so we could talk, I was going to tell you that I-"

"Oh no," he groans, lifting both of his hands to cover his eyes, pressing the heels of his palms into his sockets. "Please don't tell me what I think you're going to tell me."

Kate chuckles, a quiet, sad little sound that wrenches his heart, but the graze of her fingers at his forearms, traveling upwards to draw his hands from his face softens the blow he knows is coming.

"I had hoped to tell you that I'd changed my mind, but then Gina showed up and it was just… too late," she sighs, but she's already blinking away the trace melancholy in her eyes when he opens his. "And it was probably for the best. The timing wasn't right."

"It's never the right time, especially not with us," he points out, knowing the whine is staining his voice, tugging a smirk across her lips, but the distress consuming his chest is all too real. "We could have been together, we still could have-"

"Here now," she reminds him, releasing his hands to splay hers along the cage of his ribs. "Believe me, Castle, I know. But going over the 'if only's is only going to drive us both crazy."

He hugs her, because he doesn't know what else to do, to say, so he wraps his arm around her and tries not to dwell so deeply on the memories now resurfacing, the look on her face when his ex-wife had shown up, the desolation in her eyes as she had wished him a great summer, the hope and overwhelming uncertainty in her question of 'see you in the fall'.

"Stop thinking so loud," she mumbles, her lips at his jaw and her knuckles coasting up and down his sides. "We missed a lot of opportunities throughout the years, but you took one when it mattered most."

He sighs, tightens the band of his arms around her shoulders before letting her go, drifting back towards the oven and their waiting dinner.

"Since when are you the positive one in this relationship?"

"Not necessarily positivity. Just realism, Castle."

He grins, opens his mouth to respond while he reaches for an oven mitt, but the buzz of his burner phone on the counter interrupts him, steals all of the playfulness from the room and replaces it with slow building dread. Rick redirects the course of his hand, draws the phone up to his ear and spares a look at Beckett, does his best to convey an expression of reassurance as he accepts the call from the Twelfth.

"Castle."

"Hey man, Beckett with you?"

Castle pulls the phone from his ear, beckons her closer as he presses the speaker button.

"She's here, Espo. What's wrong?"

"Nothing yet, so neither one of you panic," Esposito instructs them, but Castle can sense the _but_ coming and knows Kate can too when she purses her lips, bracing herself. "But IA combed through Beckett's phone records again, saw she'd made some calls to you over the past few months, including one the day she went off the grid."

Kate's eyes flutter closed. "I'm such an idiot."

"Like I said, no reason to panic _yet_ ," Espo emphasizes. "They don't know anything for sure, but Marcus just sent some guys to Castle's loft and if he isn't there…"

"My mother knows what's going on, she'll cover," Castle pipes up, grateful he took the time to call his mother earlier despite his initial hesitation to fill her in on the situation.

"But they'll still view it as suspicious that you and I are conveniently out of town at the same time," Beckett sighs, scraping a hand through her hair, wincing as she encounters the fresh abrasions lining her skull. "We have to go."

"I think she's right, bro," Esposito agrees on a sigh. "You've got a head start, but if they send Hamptons PD to check out your pad, they're going to search the place for her, and if they find her-"

"They won't," Castle says with conviction. "We'll pack up right now, head north. I've already got the IDs, money, everything we need."

Kate startles, staring at him with wide eyes, her face draining of color, but he doesn't have any reassurances left to give right now, refuses to even hear the argument he's sure she's constructing in her head.

"Good, Ryan and I will contact you the second we know the status of Marcus's team. Wait for our call before you head out."

"Will do," Castle mumbles. "Thanks, Espo."

"You got it."

The line goes dead and Rick heads straight for the stairs, having to wait only a beat to feel Kate at his back, snagging him by the belt before he can make it to the second floor.

"I can't ask you to do this," she whispers, her eyes dark and terrified, and he doesn't think he's ever seen her look so scared. It has him wavering before he remembers what's at stake and begins to shake his head with fervor.

"Kate-"

"You're already harboring a fugitive, Castle, you can't go on the run with me too-"

"I love you," he growls, the reason for all of this, the only explanation he needs. "You're not asking me to do anything, I'm choosing this. Choosing you."

She stares up at him with so much conflict, regret and gratitude at war in her eyes, and Castle descends from the step above her to kiss her lips, abandoning the sense of urgency and sparing a precious moment to ensure she can taste the certainty he presses to her mouth.

"Rick-"

The ring of a doorbell has them both pausing, wide-eyed and pale faced, the panic already licking up his spine.

"Hide, hide, hide," he hisses, pushing the burner phone into her hand and shoving Beckett up the stairs while he sprints down them, bolts into the kitchen to rid the table of its second plate, shoving the dishes into the washer.

The doorbell rings again, this time accompanied by an insistent series of knocks.

"Coming," he calls out, sliding the oven mitt onto his hand, scanning the rooms he bypasses on his way to the door for signs of anything out of the ordinary.

The knocks grow more demanding, but once Rick finally reaches the door, tugs it open, he's greeted by a sheepish looking man, his uniform neat, as if it rarely saw much use, and an apologetic smile on his face.

"Good evening, Mr. Castle. My name is Chief Brady and I'm really sorry to intrude, but we received a call from the NYPD that there's a possibility you're harboring a fugitive, the rogue cop that's been on the news all day?" Brady informs him. "And we've been instructed to check it out."

"Rogue cop?" Castle repeats, stepping aside to allow Brady and the two fellow officers at his back past the front door. "I'm sorry, I drove out here a couple of days ago to write and haven't been keeping up with the news ever since, but you're welcome to have a look around."

"Thanks for your cooperation," Brady beams, looking all too relieved. He doubts the Hamptons Police could handle much, let alone a force like Kate Beckett, and Brady must know it. "But yeah, _apparently_ , this cop… what was her name, Andrews?"

"Beckett," one of the other men quips while the four of them venture further into the house. "Shame, too. She's one hot cop. Hate to see her rot away in a cell."

"She used to be your muse or something, wasn't she, Mr. Castle?" the second of Brady's two men inquires, suspicion lining the older man's features, but Castle only nods, tapping into his years of watching his mother act, playing up the expression of shock that claims his face.

"Beckett's a fugitive?" he questions, coming to a halt once they reach the main room, leaning into the wall as if for support. "That… can't be right. I haven't seen her in years, but she – she would never-"

"Mr. Castle," Brady sighs, clapping Rick on the shoulder and offering him an expression of sympathy. "I'm sorry we had to be the ones to inform you of this tragic news, but throughout my years on the force, I've learned that, unfortunately, you never know someone as well as you think you do."

Castle swallows, nods in false agreement. "I guess you're right."

"And you say you haven't seen this woman in years?" the older cop, Collins, according to his nameplate, repeats, still skeptical, but his distrust is waning now.

"No, we… we used to work together, but things became too complicated and we decided it was time we went our separate ways," Castle explains, not exactly a lie, and Collins nods his understanding, sharing a touch of Brady's sympathy. "But I had no idea she had gotten wrapped up in something like this."

"Women," Andrews mumbles, shaking his head and glancing towards the stairs. "Want to take the second floor with me, Collins?"

Officer Collins nods, not much of a talker when he isn't interrogating, and starts towards the stairs with the blonde haired Andrews while Brady remains on the ground floor with Rick.

"You don't mind if I look around down here, do you?" Brady asks him and Castle shakes his head, doing his best not to shift his eyes towards the stairs, to let Brady in on the nerves swarming his insides.

They wouldn't find her. They wouldn't.

Brady leaves his side with another sympathetic smile, strolling through the living room, towards the bedroom Kate had stayed in earlier this morning. Rick heads in the opposite direction, back into the kitchen to retrieve dinner from the stove, and sighs his relief that he had disposed of the bloodied pillowcase, the towels in the bathroom.

Brady isn't gone long, joining Castle in the kitchen only moments after he's placed the lasagna on the stovetop to cool.

"Entertaining tonight?"

"I did have a friend coming over," Rick nods, throwing in a feigned smile at the implication Brady picks up on, but allowing it to fall under the weight of the news that appeared on his doorstep. "But I don't really think I'm in the mood now."

"Aww, now, don't let this ruin your plans," Brady consoles him. "Whatever happens with Detective Beckett is out of your control. No use worrying yourself over it, right?"

"No, you're right," Castle concurs, dividing up the servings of lasagna while Brady makes a show of investigating the kitchen, deeming it safe, but Rick is waiting for the men he can hear stomping around upstairs, trying not to hold his breath every time the noises stop.

"The place is clear, Chief," Andrews calls, bounding down the stairs with Collins in tow. "And we already had an officer search the property's perimeter, so I think we're good to go."

"That we are," Brady chirps, rounding the kitchen to join the two men drifting towards the door. Castle follows after them, his lungs expanding with their first full breath, and walks them out towards the driveway where two patrol cars sit waiting. "We apologize again for the disturbance, Mr. Castle. And that you had to find out about your friend this way."

"No apology necessary," Castle assures Brady, nodding to the other men who still offer him sympathy that is quickly growing patronizing. "I guess it was for the best that Beckett and I parted when we did."

"True that, wouldn't want to be caught up in a mess like this," Andrew mutters. "And I definitely wouldn't want to have to deal with those guys at Internal Affairs. They're chomping at the bit to find this chick, and the longer they go without, the more pissed the guy in charge becomes."

"From what we've heard," Brady shrugs, already opening the door to the driver's seat of his vehicle. "But it's not our problem anymore. Let the NYPD handle it."

"Do call us if you have any form of contact with Detective Beckett, though," Collins adds, narrowing his grey eyes on Castle. "That woman is dangerous, Mr. Castle, and probably desperate."

"I can assure you, if I hear anything, you guys will be my first call," Castle lies, grateful when all three of them seem to buy his words without question.

"Thank you for your time," Brady calls out, slipping into his car with Andrews, Collins sliding into the other, and Rick takes his time making his way back to his door, stepping back inside and waiting until both cars are out of his driveway, too far up the road for him to see any longer.

And then he races for the stairs.


	7. Chapter 7

Kate holds her breath at the return of footsteps, curling in on herself in the darkness, away from the splinters of light that seep through the paneling, the twin pre-paid phones, the go bag that had been tucked under his bed, and the jacket she had left in his bathroom this morning all clutched to her chest.

"Kate?"

She exhales, reaches up for the screws to the air vent paneling she had hastily twisted back into place, and pushes the metal shield forwards until it clatters onto the hardwood of the hallway floor.

The rush of Castle's footsteps follows and then he's appearing into her square view of focus, a lopsided grin on his face.

"You're brilliant," he whispers, kicking away the paneling and holding his arms out to her so she can climb from the boxed shape hole that she had squeezed into the second it caught her eye.

Most cops she knew would check every potential hiding spot, shine a light in every dark corner, but she had been banking on the fact that the Hamptons PD would be less than thorough, and she had been right. The two officers that had scoped out the upper half of Castle's home had done nothing more than a brief sweep of each room, bypassing the vent just big enough to harbor a human in the main hallway without a second glance.

Castle hugs her once she's free of her confinement, breathes out his relief against her shoulder.

"Did they suspect anything at all?" she murmurs, returning his embrace before standing with him to wipe the dust from her clothing.

"No, I told them I hadn't spoken to you in years, pretended I was shocked that they were even looking for you," he recounts, bending to arrange the vent back into place. "One guy was skeptical, probably didn't believe me completely, but they bought it."

"Martha would be proud."

Rick preens, jerking a quiet laugh from her lips, but the levity of their situation lasts only a moment before it's dissipating, his smile falling as he starts back towards his bedroom.

"We need to-" The phone lights up against her chest, silenced but cutting off his declaration, demanding their attention once more.

"Beckett," she answers, following Castle into the master bedroom and setting the phone to speaker.

"I'm going to take it this means hiding from Hamptons PD worked out well?" Ryan assumes, a wince in his words, and Castle huffs.

"A head's up would have been nice," he mutters, bending to his knees in front of the fireplace, working loose the paneling he had mentioned to her earlier, where he kept a gun she'd had no idea he owned.

"Hey, I'm doing my best here," Esposito growls from nearby.

"Any word on Bracken? IA's progress? Anything?" Beckett inquires, pacing at Castle's back and battling with her fingers' urge to grip the phone too tightly.

"No to Bracken, but we just learned about the contact with Hamptons PD. From the sounds of it, they don't think Castle's involved, but Marcus ordered that they're to be keeping an eye on him just in case," Esposito relays in a hushed tone, and Kate can just picture the two of them, huddled in the break room, risking their jobs for her.

"Wait, does that mean we can't make a move?" Castle questions, abandoning his work with the fireplace to stand with her, glaring down at the phone poised between them.

"You move, that's going to look suspicious," Esposito confirms.

"And if they think you're helping Beckett, they may combine their resources, send half the force after you," Ryan adds solemnly, sending the tension in Castle's shoulder ratcheting higher. "And that could tip off Bracken."

"So what are we supposed to do, just sit here? Hope no one finds us?" Castle demands, his frustration simmering to a boiling point, and Kate reaches out, hooks her fingers in his belt loop to tug him closer.

"Ryan and I are working on a plan," Esposito responds, his tone calm, always calm under pressure. "But for now? Yeah, the safer option for Beckett is to stay hidden. You two make a run for it, the risk sky rockets."

Castle scrubs a hand over his eyes.

"Someone is going to connect the dots and figure out Beckett is with me. They'll search my home, come here next, and the next person they send – whether it be Bracken or IA – is going to do a better job of combing through my place."

"It won't come to that," Ryan insists, his voice firm with belief, but she can see that Castle has no faith left, that the silver linings he once carried in abundance have now blurred into bleakness.

"And even if it does, we'll fight our way through," Kate murmurs, only for him, and earns the tentative slide of his eyes to her face for it. "We've been in plenty of bad situations before and made it out. This will be no different."

"Yeah, bro. You guys are magnets for trouble, but you always come out on top and usually in one piece."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Espo," Castle sighs, quirking his lips for her, and Kate releases his belt loop to skim her hand around to the small of his back.

"Just don't end up with hypothermia again, Beckett," Ryan throws in and Castle's smile immediately falters, his brow knitting with confusion.

"Or at the hands of another contract killer."

"Third time is _not_ the charm."

"Guys," Beckett interrupts, shifting under the weight of Castle's gaze, his eyes burning blue and piercing her with questions that demand her explanation. "Call us when you have something."

The boys are both silent for a beat before murmuring their confirmation, seemingly aware of what they've done and adding their apologies before disconnecting the call.

"What are they talking about?" Castle asks, his eyes scanning her body from head to toe, as if searching for evidence of Ryan and Esposito's comments. "The last time you had hypothermia was when we were trapped in the freezer together, and the contract killer… are they talking about Maddox?"

Kate swallows and lowers the phone to her side. "No. A little over a month ago, there was this undercover mission. It… it went bad."

Horror washes through his face, an overwhelming wave of guilt splashing through the darkening hues of his eyes, and Castle cups her shoulders in his palms, desperation in the grip of his fingers.

"Tell me."

"Castle, it-"

Her stomach growls and her cheeks flush with embarrassment, but she's grateful for the interlude. They both need a breather from this heavy conversation before it can truly begin, from the stress the visit from the police and their call with the boys has added.

"Tell me while we have dinner," he amends, trailing his hands down her arms to place one to the small of her back.

"It's not a long story," Kate murmurs, descending down the stairs with him, taking the familiar path back into the kitchen, where she's noticed the dish of lasagna now sits atop the stove, ready to be served. Castle arches an eyebrow at her over his shoulder, waiting, and she sighs in defeat. "I had been recruited to infiltrate a drug ring. It was supposed to be a simple meeting, in and out, but-"

"It went wrong, of course," he assumes, scooping two squares of lasagna onto his plate and a new one he retrieves from the cabinet overhead.

Beckett takes a seat at the table, laces her fingers together atop the empty placemat in front of her. "It had been going okay until I met with the second in command of the ring. Vulcan Simmons."

She lifts her eyes to find Castle arrested between the kitchen and the dining area, their plates balanced in his hands.

"What happened?"

She waits for him to join her, slip into the seat beside her with both the need to know and the fear of knowing burning in his gaze.

"He tortured me, dunked my head in ice water for a while to try and make me talk," Beckett explains, staring down at the delicious meal he had prepared for them, still warm despite its time out of the oven, but her stomach feels knotted, her appetite gone. "Afterwards, he sent me with one of his men into the woods, ordered him to execute me, but the woman I had been there to impersonate showed up before he could."

"She saved you?"

Kate shrugs one of her shoulders. "Not by choice. It was an order from the head of it all. His way of paying off a debt."

"Who-" Castle stills, his brow scrunching with effort this time. "A voicemail, one you sent me last year," he murmurs, searching for the memory as a fresh wave of dread sweeps through her insides, claims her stomach with its vicious crash. Calling him after the case that had rattled her to her core, confiding into the messaging system while she had still been so raw, hadn't been her proudest moment.

It was the one voicemail she wishes she could erase.

"It was Bracken, wasn't it?" he questions, his eyes clear now, sharp with knowledge. "You told me you had to save his life, how sick it had made you to save your mother's killer… And saving you in return, that was his way of paying off the debt."

She lowers her gaze to the lasagna, but the nausea in her stomach has her pushing back from the table, has Castle looking up to her with concern outweighing the dawn of realization in his eyes.

"Kate?"

"I'm not – I just need some fresh air," she murmurs, striding through the few feet that separate the table from the doors and slipping out into the brisk air of the night.

* * *

The patio just outside his kitchen is well concealed from the outside world, from anyone who may be keeping eyes on them. He knows that no one except him can see her huddled up in one of the lounge chairs by the pool, that she's safe and that he should allow her the time to collect herself, to breathe through the leftover trauma he probably triggered forcing her to recount the event with Simmons, the mounting history with Bracken.

So he tries to give her the space she needs, picking at his food and placing hers back into the oven with the rest of the dish to keep his neglected meal warm. He manages four bites of his lasagna and less than five minutes before he's deserting his dinner and following Kate outside, approaching her with caution and an apology already in his mouth.

"I'm sorry," he offers, earning a bewildered glance towards him.

"For what, Castle?" she mumbles while he pads closer, patting the cushioned space beside her, and affection surges through his chest.

"For making you relive that, pushing you to tell me." Rick eases onto the chair, a tight fit with the two of them, but she wastes no time remedying the issue, draping her legs across his lap. "For not being there."

"Rick," she reprimands softly, touching her fingertips to the exposed skin of his chest, where the neck of the t-shirt he wears fails to cover.

Castle sucks in a shaky breath and curls an arm around her waist, still mystified by the give of her body into his. "Since we split up, you've nearly died on three different occasions and I wasn't there to have your back."

"See what happens when you leave me alone?" she muses, but his chest is too tight to laugh.

For over a year, she had called him, left him voicemails, given a clear idea of how severe the war with Bracken had become. And he hadn't even taken the time to listen to them, to prevent any of the hell she has been through.

"Rick, this isn't your fault. I made a choice to continue pursuing my mother's case, pursuing Bracken. I knew what I was getting into."

"Yeah, and what do I do when you choose it again, Kate? When you choose a case over your life, over being happy? What if _this_ is never enough for you?" he questions, too sharp, surprising them both.

There are too many conflicting emotions swelling in his chest, grief and anger, guilt and betrayal, and the last thing he wants is a fight, can't handle another fight with her.

Their last fight is still fresh on his mind, the one before that, how easy it is for this case to leave them both raw and bloodied and divided. Without even realizing it, he's already mentally preparing his argument, steeling his heart against hers.

Beckett shifts against him, establishing space between them that sparks his nerves, the instinctive conviction that she's prepared to push him away. So he carefully disentangles from the cove of her body first, slips from beneath the weight of her legs and moves to the edge of the lounge chair.

"Castle-" She reaches for him, but he can't think straight like this, can't have a conversation that won't end the same as they always have with her.

They've had enough time apart to last a lifetime, but after the past 24 hours they've endured, maybe a few extra minutes is what they both need right now.

"I'm going to take a walk on the beach," he mumbles, rising from the chair, evading the graze of her fingers to his arm. "You should head back in, eat some dinner."

Kate abandons the chair, hesitating between him and the door as he starts past the pool, towards the stretch of sand that leads from his house to the ocean.

"Castle, wait," she sighs, stepping up behind him to grab his shoulder, but he catches her hand first, squeezes her fingers before he lets her go and watches her hand flop back to her side.

"Don't follow me," he murmurs, scraping a hand through his hair at the wounded look that claims her face, the step backwards she takes as if he physically struck her. "I don't want to risk anyone seeing you," he explains, but he knows how she's taken it, how he's hurt her in an attempt to heal himself when they've both suffered enough. "I'll come back, Kate. I just-"

"I get it," she replies, forcing a pained quirk of her lips, but no longer meeting his eyes.

Kate turns back towards the door, disappears back inside the beach house with her shoulders hunched, her posture defeated. He starts to question all over again if there ever will be a way to salvage what they once could have had, if destruction is all that's left to them.


	8. Chapter 8

She waits in his bed. There's a view of the beach from the balcony just outside his room, but she refuses to peer out and look for him. Things are still so raw and new between them and he needs space, she can accept that, can relate all too well. But she's grown so very tired of space.

Kate draws her knees up to her chest in the moonlit bedroom out of habit. It's only been a half hour, but time is dragging by and he had given her no estimate of how long he would be out on the beach. She had forced a serving of lasagna down her throat in the meantime, hardly tasting but knowing her body was running on empty, in need of fuel, and proceeded to wander the house afterwards, dusting her fingertips along family photos, lingering in his office, imagining him here during summers past.

She isn't sure where he had wanted her to sleep, if he had preferred her downstairs or in an upstairs bedroom nearby, but she saw no appeal in crawling into any bed except his, especially when they still needed to talk before either of them turn in for the night.

The open and close of a door downstairs hooks her attention, the sound of him climbing the stairs, and Kate inhales a deep breath, ends up holding it as she waits for him to enter the room.

Castle shuffles through the doorway with his head down, already tugging the t-shirt over his head and tossing it towards the laundry hamper near his closet. And she knows she's already seen him naked, had his body bare and sealed against hers only hours ago, but she still releases her breath at the sight of his bared chest.

Rick jumps at the sound, swivels towards her with his hand to his chest, flattening his palm over the center of his sternum.

"Beckett," he huffs, assessing the picture of her in his bed before dropping his eyes down to the empty side of the mattress. "I didn't think you'd be in here."

"You make me happy," she states in lieu of an answer, watching his eyes flicker back to her, reluctantly offering her his attention and loosening the knot in her chest. "You've always managed to make me happy."

He shifts towards the bed, but doesn't yet sit, ghosting along the edge of the mattress with his eyes apprehensive to remain on her.

"I heard you, the last time we fought," she continues, unfolding her legs and twisting her fingers together in her lap. "I heard myself too, how deep in the obsession I dove, how ready for a war I was. I didn't – I hadn't meant for it to be a choice between you and the case. It just wasn't apparent to me until that moment that I couldn't have both. I thought I would solve it, that I would find justice for my mom, and then I could have you and it'd be so easy."

"Us? Easy?" he mutters, the amusement dull but twitching at the corners of his mouth. "Not our style, Beckett."

"No," she concurs on a sigh, watching the lean of his body into the headboard from beneath the shade of her lashes.

"I kept expecting to get a call from Ryan, that it'd be Montgomery all over again, planning your funeral," he confesses, directing his eyes to the lampshade next to the bed, holding his gaze away from her. But she's glad for once, relieved he doesn't see the ache that she can feel ripple through her features as her chest cracks. "I would have done anything for you, Kate. But I wasn't going to watch you die."

"I never wanted to die," she whispers, staring at the curve of his shoulder, stained in moonlight. "I just wanted it to be over. I didn't think about anything else, how it affected the people I cared about."

"And you obviously didn't stop after we… after we were done."

Her shoulders lift with a shrug. "Nothing left to lose."

"You consider your life nothing?" he growls, a fierce mixture of horror and rage igniting in his gaze.

"Finding justice for my mom has been my goal for the last fifteen years, Castle. When you came into the picture, after that day on the swings, I had another goal to work towards," she murmurs, struggling not to shrink under his scrutiny, the anguish that blossoms to life in his eyes the more she talks. Part of her wishes she had retreated to another bedroom after all. "After I lost you, I put everything I had back into taking down Bracken."

"Did you even consider your dad? Your family at the precinct? How I would have felt if-"

"I don't need this lecture again," she cuts in, the words too familiar, too close to a wounded part of her that only he has the ability to touch. "And I didn't have blinders on this time, Rick. I was more careful."

"I found you passed out on the floor of a motel hallway, drunk and bleeding after being tortured by two of Bracken's men. That's _careful_?" he bites out, his anger simmering closer to the surface, but the grief in his voice overcompensates. "What if I wouldn't have found you in time, Beckett? What if-"

"You already know the answer," she gets out, forcing down a swallow at the sudden lump of emotion that sneaks up on her, tries to climb up her throat and past her lips. "And I'm sorry, I've told you-"

"I don't want you to be sorry," he groans, pacing away from the bed, exasperated. "I just want you to be safe. That's all I've ever wanted for you, Kate. Whether we ended up together or not, I just want you to live. But it's - it's terrifying to love someone who practically chases after death."

He lifts his eyes to the ceiling, but she can still see the shimmer of tears pooling along the corners. She wants to be closer, to soothe the pain she's inflicted, the wounds she's ripped the scabs from, but she remains rooted to her spot in the middle of the mattress, afraid to touch him, to make it worse.

"That wasn't - Bracken, justice for my mom… that wasn't all I was chasing this past year," she whispers, an admission he already knows, and Kate watches as his throat bobs, his eyes blinking away the threat of moisture, composing himself. "Tell me how to fix this, Castle."

"Just tell me what you need," he murmurs, so tired and defeated, his composure intact but his words desperate as they tumble free. "This case, the obsession you mentioned, is what tore us apart in the first place and I can't - I can't lose you again. Not to this. But if it's what you need… I won't try to stop you. So I just - tell me-"

"You." His eyes finally rise to meet hers, some of that anguished shade of blue draining from his irises, offering room for the tentative spill of light. "If there's a choice? It's you."

"Me?"

"My choice was you the night I showed up on your doorstep, has been you every day since. And I'm not saying that this makes the void that my mom left disappear, that need for justice is still present, but when it comes down to it… I want to choose my own happiness over everything else, because I know that's what she would want."

He's useless for a second, speechless, unable to do much more than stare back at her with so much hope brimming in his gaze.

"I make you happy?"

Kate huffs, her eyes rolling as she rises on her knees and crawls across the bed towards him. "I told you," she murmurs, resisting the urge to touch him for a moment longer. "I need you, Rick. More than anything else, I just need you."

* * *

Her arms twine around his neck, winding slowly, as if she expects him to step out of her reach. Castle leans in to eradicate her doubts, draping his palms at her hips and circling his thumbs over the sharp juts of bone. The subtle jerk of her body beneath his hands surprises him, so responsive to a simple touch.

This is not how he had expected their argument to end.

"After this, it'll be over. One way or another, I'm done, Castle. I promise," Kate murmurs and he releases her hips to wrap his arms around her waist, fisting his hands in the loose fabric draped at her back.

"I don't want it to be an ultimatum, for you to feel like you have to choose," he admits, stroking the curve of her spine through the stretch of his t-shirt. "We can still go after Bracken, we can do it together this time, the right way-"

"No," she mumbles, turning her face into his neck, awakening goosebumps along his flesh with her mouth so close, the heat of her breath fanning out across the quiver of his pulse. "You were right. It's going to kill me and I - I just need to stop."

"We can stop, take a break," he nods, his arms snaking higher to cradle her body, combing the loose hair back from her face. "We won't let him become president. We'll work on a plan, strategize with the boys-"

"Castle," she sighs, lifting her head with a hint of a smile on her lips, soft but waning, as tired as he feels. "You're right, we won't let him become president. We'll figure something out and I can assure you that I'm done trying to do any of this on my own."

He hadn't realized how much he had needed to hear those words until his lungs expand in his chest once she speaks them, the constant, nagging fear for her life at risk due to her own actions finally seizing. Stopping the Dragon has always been her mission, became their mission, and it had never been his intent to take that away from her. He had only wanted to change the way they did it, to keep her alive throughout the process.

"But tonight? I don't want to think about it anymore," Kate continues, her eyes fluttering from his gaze to caress his mouth while her hands withdraw from his back to snag in the hem of the t-shirt shirt at her hips.

"You… don't," he echoes, mesmerized by the slow trail of the material up her abdomen, revealing taut planes of skin he's already seen, touched, but has hardly been allowed to appreciate long enough.

His hands joins hers before the shirt can scale her chest, easing the material over her head while she extends her arms, lets the fabric drop to the edge of the bed, slip to the floor next to his feet. He thoughtlessly grazes his knuckles along her abdomen, watching the muscles ripple at the contact, noticing the gentle thrust of her hips when he skims the waistband of her pants.

The heat of her skin is contagious, traveling up from the pads of the fingers he skims along her side, igniting the slow spread of fire up his arm, through his bloodstream. The shudder of her breath tears his eyes away from the sight of her so bare and exposed in front of him, up to her face to see the arousal flooding her gaze, leaking color into her cheeks, flushing pink across her chest.

She isn't shy, no, but he can sense the lack of confidence he had grown to recognize, can read the uncertainty that hides beneath the lust consuming her gaze.

"No," she states, her voice even, but darker, sultry. The bedroom voice he had only ever heard in past rounds of teasing that never led anywhere. So much better now with her body, her mouth, only a breath away from touching his.

The return of her fingers at his shoulders is kinetic, electricity buzzing through every inch of skin, inhabiting his bones, and Castle frames her narrow waist, drifts in close enough that his thighs press into the edge of the mattress. He can see the need flaring gold in her eyes, illuminating the black pools of her pupils through the tangle of their lashes.

"I don't want to talk at all."

The maddening brush of her fingertips glides along the bones of his shoulders, up to the back of his neck where they submerge into his hair.

"You're sure?" he mumbles, and oh, he needs to know now if she isn't, because the way she's biting her bottom lip, grazing her nose along the skin of his cheek… he won't be able to stop. "Your head-"

"Is fine," Beckett assures him, kissing the corner of his mouth, her tongue slipping past her lips to tease. "I want you, this."

It's all the confirmation he needs.

* * *

 **A/N: The rating for chapter nine will be bumped up to M. If you are uncomfortable or uninterested in this shift, please feel free to skip over it. T rating will be back in chapter ten.**


	9. Chapter 9

Castle turns his head to capture her mouth, the hum of her moan already surging through his system as she opens for him, lets him sip greedily from her lips, her tongue. It doesn't take long at all for the thrum of longing through his veins to spread, the yearning for her visceral, demanding after so many years of merely fantasizing about this moment, after accepting he was never going to have it.

Kate arches at the splay of his palms to the small of her back, the lurch of her body nearly knocking him off balance. Their hips clash, the graze of her breasts sparking shockwaves through his chest, and he needs to breathe, to slow down, savor this.

Castle's hands coast down her bare sides, causing her breath to catch and stutter against his lips, her hips shivering at the hook of his thumbs in the band of his sweatpants around her waist. Her forehead crashes into his as he tugs them down to her knees, curving his hands at the back of her thighs and carefully lifting her up, just long enough to lay her down across his bed.

Kate kicks the pants the rest of the way down her legs the second she settles on her back, pushes at the band of his own bottoms with her toes once he's crawling onto the edge of the bed, following the travel of her body up the mattress and balancing himself above her.

"Castle," she husks, her voice, the insistent curl of her fingers at his neck, too good to ignore. He descends down to meet her mouth again, to kiss a path along the cutting angle of her jaw, discovering the sensitive flesh behind her ear that makes her moan, the tendon in her neck that has her body squirming beneath his, arching when he uses his teeth.

One of her legs rises high around his hip, her body a constant wave of movement, undulating beneath his and earning a roll of response from his hips.

"Kate," he breathes, rocking into the cradle of her hips, unable to stop.

Her hands drift down his back, her nails scraping a tantalizing trail down his skin, and squeeze at his ass, yanking at the fabric that fists beneath her fingers. He tugs on her bottom lip once with his teeth, soothes the sting with his tongue at her grunt of surprise before he pulls away, shifting to his knees to shimmy the pants from his waist, jerking them down his legs, his boxers following suit.

Kate had shown no shame in perusing the naked canvas of his body this morning before he had sunk into a bath with her, and she doesn't hesitate to do the same now, pinning her bottom lip between her teeth even as the corners of her mouth curl upwards.

"You're beautiful," she admits, drawing a surprised laugh from his chest, but she only grins in response, staring up at him with the dark curls of her hair in a riot across the ivory covers of his pillows, her body laid out across his sheets.

She's gorgeous like this, arguably more breathtaking than he's ever seen her, and she's here, in his bed, beaming with happiness and thrumming with anticipation. He has to touch her skin, sweep his palm up the graceful line of her leg, to remind himself that this isn't a dream. That she's real, that she's survived, and in this moment, she's his.

"Stealing my lines, Beckett?" he murmurs, his hand rising to come up behind her knee, caressing the sensitive skin there and feeling her toes curl at his calf.

Her hands are already reaching to pull him back up the length of her body, but he can't help taking his time, lowering his mouth to graze along the inside of her thigh, ghosting his lips over the skin just below her belly button.

"Castle, please," she gasps, but she's urging him away from the heat emanating from between her thighs, coaxing him with the tug of her hands dragging him up her body and the twine of her legs around his waist. "Please, you first. Want you first."

And despite how badly he wishes to take her apart, feel her shatter around his mouth, he compromises, dragging two fingers through the slick, searing heat of her. Kate jumps, her thighs quivering at his shoulders while her chest trembles. He glides his tongue over her, just once, unable to resist the burst of her on his tongue, and is rewarded by a high-pitched, wholly unlike Beckett, keening noise.

"Can't wait to properly taste you," he mumbles, drifting away from the sensitive flesh to kiss a path up her stomach, over the swell of a breast, worshipping at the column of her throat, up to the altar of her mouth.

"Later," she promises into the press of his mouth, already so breathless, so eager. It amazes him, leaves him fumbling like it's his first time all over again.

Last first time. Wow.

He doesn't quite know what to do with his hands, desperate to touch every part of her all at once, until Kate steals one from her side, guides his fingers over the ribs he had been strumming to her breast. He holds the gentle weight of her in his palm, squeezes lightly and marvels over the instant response of her body, the arc of her spine and the moan that slips past her lips.

"Do you know how hard it was not to do this earlier?" he mumbles, swiping his thumb over the hardened peak of her nipple, trading his gaze between the work of his hand and the flutter of her eyes, straining not to fall closed. "In the bath? How much I wanted to touch you?"

"Touch me now," she breathes, biting her lip against the whine he can hear low in her throat, threatening to break free as he lowers his head, takes the tip of her breast into his mouth, just like he'd wanted to that morning.

He swirls his tongue, smirking around flesh as she cries out and scores his shoulder with her nails, tunnels her fingers through his hair. Castle releases her to attend to her opposite breast, dusting his lips along the bones of her sternum as he goes, grazing his teeth over her scar. But Kate cups his face in her hands before he can complete his mission, lifting her head to capture his lips, painting the seam of his mouth with her tongue until he opens for her, gasps at the flares of heat each stroke and sweep and plunge evokes.

Her hand manages to find its way into the non-existent space between them while he's distracted, the hot glide of her fingers like flames trailing their way down to where he rests hard and ready against her.

"Kate," he chokes, tangling his fingers in the strands of her hair while hers coil around his length, caressing every inch of him, circling her thumb over his tip until he's begging for reprieve, long enough to reach out for the nightstand, fumble inside for protection that's probably been sitting in his drawer for too long.

She steals the condom from him, rips the package with her teeth and shoots a spark of arousal straight to his groin. The tips of her fingers burn, bright points of contact that has his eyes slamming shut as she sheathes him in the thin layer of latex.

"You okay?" she chuckles, her grip around him loose and her free hand at his cheek, combing through the stubble along his jaw until he's able to open his eyes, stare down at her.

"I just… I've wanted you so much, for so long," he confesses, averting his eyes to the stroke of his thumb over her temple.

He hadn't meant to shift the mood into something far more sentimental than she probably wanted, but-

"I know the feeling," she whispers, shifting beneath him to tilt her hips upwards. She guides him in slowly, envelopes him in the tight, wet heat of her body, her brow furrowed in concentration as he sinks deeper inside until they're fully connected. Castle grits his teeth against the urge to thrust into the perfect grip of her around him, to succumb to the blinding white-hot pleasure already sizzling through his veins, and focuses on the woman beneath him instead.

"Oh God, Castle." Kate rocks her hips, draws twin gasps from them both, and twines her arms around his neck. "You have no idea how badly I've wanted this."

* * *

The weight of him inside her is so good, his mouth suckling at her neck and the roll of his hips creating separate points of fire, the slow burn of pleasure spreading.

And it's such a relief, such a beautiful victory after enduring a losing battle for so long, she could weep with it. But the long, thorough strokes of this rhythm they've found, the crackle of electricity between every sweep of his body over hers, is enough to distract her from the overwhelming emotions, keep her here with him in the present, in the vivid heat of this moment.

"You feel amazing," she breathes, feeling his grunt of surprise beneath her jaw, his hips slamming into her a little more forcefully at the words as his mouth returns, reclaims and plunders hers with an intensity that has her needing more.

Kate snakes her leg at his waist, hooks at his thigh, and flips him onto his back, smirking at the wide-eyed look of awe and arousal from the effortless move. She balances her hands on his chest, rising and falling into the rock of his hips, twisting without warning, grinding down hard to hear him growl.

" _Kate_."

Her name in his mouth during sex is the most erotic thing she's ever heard, feeding the desire brimming through every inch of her, at the brink of overflowing. She's already so close, knew there was no chance of lasting long, not with him.

"Say it again," she mumbles without thinking, the friction that sizzles between them, sparking from where they're joined to jolt through her veins clouding her mind. They fit so well, every glide seamless, and she thinks she could be content to remain like this forever, her skin aflame and her walls fluttering around him.

But then Castle sits up, pushes up on one of his hands and shifts her into his lap and – _oh_ , oh he's so deep, hitting a part of her that has her dancing on the sharp edge of release. Her arms lock around him automatically, her legs lacing at his waist, their bodies meeting in a tight embrace that allows her to feel the charge of his heart against his chest.

His hands scale her skin with certainty, palming her breasts before he's guiding her body in closer with the press of his hand at her tailbone, decimating the last of her self-control and sending their rhythm into a frenzy.

Their mouths clash, too breathless for a kiss, and Kate presses her forehead to his cheek, chokes on a sob at the perfect pressure, the pound of her heart too fast in her chest.

"I love you," he breathes against her ear, kissing the tender skin beneath and making her shiver. "So much, Kate."

Her body bows over him, that slow building fire roaring to consume her from the inside out with flames so blinding and intense, too much when he presses two fingers to her clit, circles with just the right amount of pressure, and she finally shatters apart.

Kate collapses against him, her hips still quivering as he finds his release on the edge of hers, groaning her name into the curve of her neck. She doesn't realize until she's floated down from the crest of her high that he's slumped back against the headboard, cradling the sprawl of her body to his chest, still panting beneath her.

He shudders when she opens her mouth at his collarbone, planting an innocent kiss to the hollow of his throat.

"Need me to get up?" she murmurs, tasting the sweat on his skin, but Castle shakes his head, traces his fingers up and down her spine.

"In a minute," he sighs, his eyes closed when she lifts her head, a content smile gracing his lips, looking utterly love drunk.

Kate grins and sits up, listens to him groan at the movement, dusting his fingers along the backs of her thighs. He shifts beneath her to dispose of the condom before relaxing back into the pillows with her still in his lap.

"Your head still okay?" he asks, combing his gaze over the injuries hidden beneath her hair and reaching up to brush back the strands clinging to her cheeks.

"Never better," she assures him, even if there is a slight piercing sensation through her skull where she knows the deepest of her wounds lies. But already, the pain is dulling, buried beneath the spread of pleasure through her system.

"Liar," he huffs.

"Worth it," she tosses back, maneuvering with him to lie down in the bed, propping her chin atop his chest. "Mm, anything is worth that."

Castle quirks an eyebrow at her. "You're sappy after sex?"

"No, probably just your fault," she grumbles, craning her neck to wipe the smirk clean from his mouth, and allowing her body to sink into his side.

They would both need time to recover, but she had no plans of drifting off to sleep any time soon. They had far too much lost time to make up for, old wounds to heal.

"I'll happily take the blame."

"Good. You'll be held accountable for a lot more before the night is over."


	10. Chapter 10

The sound of a zipper is what wakes her, the smell of coffee not far, but the lack of warmth in the bed disconcerting. She had not expected Castle to leave her to wake alone on their first morning after, but once she pries her eyes open, blinks past the sleep, the remnants of bliss from three rounds in his bed, and the soft breach of light through the bedroom windows, she sees that while he isn't in the bed, she isn't alone.

Lying on her side with the sheet clutched to her chest and his pillow beneath her cheek, Kate has a perfect view of him near the walk-in closet, dressed in only his boxers and tossing articles of clothing into a pile next to the go bags he had mentioned yesterday.

"Castle?"

He pauses in what he's doing at the call of her name, the shirt in his hands forgotten as the smile claims his lips, the crease in his brow gone once his eyes land on her.

"Hey," he murmurs, his voice still in that low, husky tone she remembers from the middle of the night, when she had woken him from dozing beside her with her mouth exploring his skin. Rick abandons the clothing pile to return to her, retrieving a steaming cup of coffee from the nightstand and holding it out to her with a grin. "Made you coffee."

"Thanks," she mumbles, but her hand bypasses the coffee mug when she reaches for him, her fingers curling around his nape instead. He doesn't deny her, following the guide of her hand to press a kiss to her mouth and crawling back into the bed with her at the insistence of her fingers in his hair.

Kate sits up in the bed once he pulls away, accepting the hot cup he hands her. "What're you doing over there?"

"Oh, just… packing," he shrugs, but his gaze is following the slip of the sheet down her torso.

"Packing?" she repeats around the rim of her mug, taking a sip of the rich caffeine, the hint of vanilla that spreads across her tongue, and humming with satisfaction. She had been brewing her own coffee every morning for over a year now, but she could never make it even close to as good as his.

"I - well, um-"

"Castle," she chuckles, cradling her cup to her chest. "You've seen it all before. Twice now."

"Beckett, I can already assure you that there will _never_ be a day where I am not riveted by the glorious sight of your breasts."

Her eyes roll, but she can't help shifting in closer to him, leaning into his warmth and absentmindedly touching her lips to the first place she can reach.

"Good to know," she hums against his shoulder. "Now why are you packing?"

Castle sighs, glancing back towards the bags in the closet doorway. "I think we should leave tonight."

Her body begins to stiffen without her permission, all of the fears and worries she had left on the floor with her clothes seeping back into her skin, brought back to life in the light of day. It had been easy to forget with Castle, to let his love consume her like a bubble, blocking out all that is currently wrong with their reality.

"I need to run it over with the boys, I know," he continues, his voice tight, nervous. "But we're sittings ducks waiting here, Kate, and I just - I want to take you someplace safe."

Affection bubbles in her chest, swells in her throat, and she smears a kiss to the hinge of his jaw, stains another to his mouth when he turns his head, lifts his arm to tangle his fingers in her hair.

"Where is safe?" she asks, feeling some of the tension his admission had created beneath his skin unwinding at her question, the lack of argument or reprimand he had apparently been prepared to receive.

Castle takes one last kiss from her mouth, knocks his forehead into hers while his eyes fall closed. "Toronto, for now. I know a few places we could stay and from then on, we can plan what to do next."

Kate shudders out a breath, draws her knees up to curl against the cage of his ribs, her lips quirking when his arm bands around them and strokes his thumb along the line of her shin beneath the sheet.

"Okay," she decides, stretching past him to place her cup on the nightstand. "We'll go to Canada tonight."

His lips press to the top of her head, dusting reverently along the sensitive spots, the still healing lacerations lining her skull. "It won't be forever. Won't even be long, Kate."

She doesn't have a reply to that, her fears that he could be wrong not worth speaking, but she does draw the sheet from her waist, slides into Castle's lap and rocks her hips to hear him gasp.

"We're not leaving until tonight?"

"No," he murmurs as Kate folds her legs around his waist, flicks her eyes to the adjoining bathroom that already held good memories for them. She wanted to make more. "Then we have plenty of time to shower, hmm?"

Castle chuckles, already easing off of the bed without disentangling the coil of her limbs from around him, carrying her towards the bathroom as if she was weightless.

"Even if we didn't," he mumbles, placing his mouth to the taut skin just beneath her jaw, a spot he had memorized last night, and Kate bows forward, hardly registers the hiss of water and slow fill of steam through the room. "We'd make time."

* * *

Kate had nudged him out of the bathroom after he had dried his hair with a towel and stepped into a clean pair of boxers. The hum of the blow dryer he had found for her in Alexis's bathroom down the hall now filling the room while Castle tugs on a pair of jeans, a comfortable black sweater, and resumes his packing process.

They can find Kate new clothes once they're settled somewhere, but for now, she'll need something clean to wear aside from the clothes that were waiting for her downstairs in the laundry room. Rummaging through his own closet, though, where only a small portion of his summer wardrobe resides, is proving useless and his daughter's was empty, save for a few bathing suits that he had tried not to study too closely.

Though, he really wanted to know when Alexis had bought such a small bikini, wanted even more to remove the thing from her wardrobe and burn it in his fireplace.

Castle sighs and trots out of the bedroom, down the stairs to retrieve Kate's clothes from atop the dryer where they had been left sitting all night. He would just have to make a run back into town before they departed for the night, purchase a few days' worth of women's clothing from the local Target.

More importantly, he needs to call Ryan and Esposito, inform them of his plan, just in case. He already predicts another lecture about staying put, but his paranoia is becoming unbearable, his eyes scanning each window he passes, expecting to see the flash of a sniper's scope, more of Bracken's men coming to finish the job, or even what was once the welcome flash of red and blue lights in his driveway.

It wasn't safe for Kate to stay here and he knows Ryan and Esposito will recognize that.

Rick climbs the stairs, her clothes draped over his arm as he strolls back into his bedroom, the blow dryer off and Kate perched on the edge of his bed in only her towel.

"Hey, brought your clothes," he quips, but Kate doesn't look up, her gaze intent on something in the go bag he'd tossed onto the bed. "Kate?"

"What's this?" she murmurs, plucking the iPhone case from atop the folded pile of clothes, and he shrugs a little sheepishly.

"Yesterday at the store, I saw it and I just thought… I know you probably won't even have to keep the burner phone for long, but in the meantime, I thought you'd like a case for it," he explains, and Kate glances up from her study of the ivory colored case decorated with a parade of colorful elephants along the back. "I know you love the elephants-"

"The elephants," she echoes, her brow scrunching, adorable but troubled, and Castle approaches her with concern.

"Is something wrong with it?" he inquires, placing her clothes to the edge of the bed beside her. "If you don't like it, that's fine, Kate. We can get you a new one, or nix the idea of it altogether-"

"No, Castle, the _elephants_ ," she whispers, pushing off the bed and maneuvering around him for the nightstand, retrieving the phone he had left there, powering the device to life with the press of her thumb to the home screen and dialing the single contact he has stored aside from hers.

"What's going on?" he questions, but he's slowly beginning to notice the once familiar burn of excitement ignited in her eyes, the same look she would get when they had a lead, a break in the case.

"I – it may be stupid, but something my mom said once… those elephants I had on my desk, those were _her_ elephants. Before they were on my desk, she used to keep them on hers. She used to joke about how they were like a family, just like us. Me, my mom, my dad… they were a family," she explains, riveted by this newfound realization, but he's still helplessly lost.

"I don't understand."

"You will, just – Esposito," she addresses, shifting the phone in her hand to tap the speaker setting. "Is my desk still the same, just the way I left it?"

"Uh, yeah? For now," Esposito answers, and good, Castle thinks, at least he's not alone in his confusion. "What's this about, boss? I can't really talk much right-"

"I need you to get the elephants," Kate stresses, chewing on her bottom lip and clutching the towel at her chest. "Before I left my apartment for the last time, I found this code in my mom's things and it's – it's a long shot, but I think my mom may have hidden evidence of her murder in those elephants."

For a moment, there is only stillness, shock and hope rippling through his insides, silence on the other end of the line before the scrape of a chair breaks the quiet. Castle steps closer to her while they both listen to sounds of movement on the other line, the rustle of fabric and a door being pulled shut.

"Got 'em, Beckett. I'm in the break room, Ryan's playing lookout from his desk. We don't have much time," Esposito murmurs and he watches Kate's knuckles go white against the towel, imagines he can hear her heart pounding just as fervently as his.

"There should be a top on one of the elephants that pops off," she instructs, the sound of rattling following her direction, and after a few seconds of bated breath, a clattering noise. "Espo?"

"A tape," he whispers. "A cassette tape just fell out of the elephant, Beckett."

Kate's eyes fly up to meet his, her lips parting for the sharp breath she sucks in.

"Give it to Gates, tell her she has to listen to it, that it's proof," she manages, swallowing hard and leaning against the bedside table at her back for support. "Call back when it's safe for us to come to the precinct."

"You got it, boss," Esposito replies dutifully, the line going dead a moment later, and Kate drops the phone to the bed.

"Castle," she whispers, covering her mouth with her hand. "Do you really think it could be-"

"Yes," he mumbles without a shred of doubt, stepping forward to grip her elbows, hold her steady. "Whatever's on that tape, if your mom left it, I think you just found the key piece of evidence to put Bracken away for good, Kate."

"No, it was you," she breathes, lowering her fingers to reveal a tentative smile, so hopeful but still so afraid. They weren't in the clear yet, not until they received a call back from Esposito, but a tape in elephant figurines that once belonged to Johanna Beckett? He refused to believe it was anything other than the proof they needed to clear Kate's name, to find the justice she had sought for so long, too long. "Castle, I never would have even made the connection if you hadn't bought that case."

"Don't be silly," he murmurs, but she's shaking her head, reaching out to grip is shirt in her fingers. "Something eventually would have clicked, brought you to the same conclusion that-"

"But because of you, it clicked _now_ , Castle. When we needed it most," she insists, releasing his shirt to retrieve the clothing on the bed, dropping the towel without hesitation and snagging her underwear from atop the thin load of laundry. "It's because of you," she continues, slipping her arms through the straps of her bra and maneuvering her legs into her jeans. Castle huffs, hooks the clasp of her bra into place for her while she buttons the jeans, doesn't resist the urge to brush his knuckles along her bare sides before she can ease the shirt over her head.

He doesn't expect her to snake her arms around his waist, to smudge a kiss to the skin of his throat.

"Because you bought a phone case you knew would make me smile despite the situation we're in," she mumbles, glancing up at him with tenderness crinkling the corners of her eyes. "That's what you've always done."

"Purchased phone cases that fit your tastes?"

"You provide a bright spot," she corrects, narrowing her eyes at his attempted humor. But he isn't used to this, to Kate… so blatantly appreciating his small efforts with words. He had never needed the verbal affirmation, the look on her face, the smile, always enough. "You make it all a little easier."

"I love you," he murmurs, the only explanation he has, and Kate's lips bloom into a smile that has nothing to do with the potential evidence they're waiting to hear back on, nothing to do with anything but him.

"Yeah, I know." Kate cradles his face in her hands when she rises to kiss him, attending to his mouth with the thorough press of her lips. "I love you too. And no matter how this turns out, that's one thing that won't change."

"No," he agrees, gripping her hips and grinning at the curve of her brow. "Already told you, Beckett. No way am I letting you go again."

Kate leans back in, her gaze on his mouth, but just as she touches her lips to his skin-

The phone begins to ring.


	11. Chapter 11

Castle's grip on her hand is firm in the elevator, his anxiety palpable, and Kate flexes her hand beneath his, twines their fingers and gives his palm a squeeze.

"Gates herself assured us the charges were dropped," she reminds him, for the hundredth time since they had packed up what little they had stored at the Hamptons house, driven in the opposite direction of Canada, back to the city.

Her own doubts haven't completely dissipated, but she had trusted the sincerity in her captain's voice as she had promised them both over the phone that after reviewing the tape in her office with the head of IA present, after hearing the recording of Bracken admitting to blackmail, to the murder of Bob Armen, of Johanna Beckett, Kate was safe.

They had entered the Twelfth without issue, met at the doors by Ryan and Esposito, embracing them both with fierce hugs and murmured words of relief. And now, the boys stood at both of their sides, loyal and ready to protect if need be.

"Trust us," Ryan chimes in. "Internal Affairs is already trying to figure out how to formally apologize to Beckett."

"Allowing me to arrest Bracken would be more than enough," Kate mumbles, feeling Castle's hand squeeze hers this time, his eyes hardened with worry, but glimmering with pride nonetheless.

The elevator doors part and Kate's gaze is immediately drawn to Gate's office doorway, open and with the woman waiting inside, Agent Marcus from IA alongside her, and the elephants on the desk.

"Ready?" Castle murmurs, his fingers loosening within the web of hers, but Kate grips him tighter, secures the twine of their hands with no intention of letting go, and nods despite the quizzical look he gives her.

"Just-" She averts her eyes to his chin, sucks in a soft breath before she meets his gaze once more. "Stay with me?"

"Always," he promises her without missing a beat, walking in tandem with her as they start towards Gates's office.

"Then yeah," she decides, bracing herself for all that is to come, to change, and holding her head high. "I'm ready."

* * *

Castle stands on the sidelines, waiting with anticipation for Kate to emerge from the building with Senator Bracken in handcuffs, to lead him down the steps to the squad car that awaits him once he reaches the sidewalk. He had called his mother when they had stopped by Beckett's apartment to allow her a change of clothes, reassured her that they were back in the city safe and sound, and quipped that she should probably turn the evening news on.

"You'll give Katherine my regards?" Martha had inquired with approval humming through her voice. "And perhaps bring the girl over for lunch tomorrow? There's so much catching up to do and celebrations to be had!"

"Mother, I - we'll see. At the moment, I just want to see Bracken put away for good. Then I'll talk to Kate about… everything else," Castle had explained, earning a murmur of understanding that he was utterly grateful for. His mother could be pushy at times, overbearing, but she always managed to understand.

"Alexis is flying in this weekend," Martha had informed him, and he hates how a fist of dread had coiled in his stomach at the mention of his daughter coming home, but he refused to keep his relationship with Kate a secret, and that meant telling Alexis. "I didn't say anything, darling. But I think she has an inkling."

"What? How?" he had questioned, combing through his memory for any indication of how Alexis could have learned about any of this.

"She'd heard that Detective Beckett was on the run from the authorities and her words were something along the lines of if Katherine was running, you were likely running after her," his mother had revealed, recounting the words far more pleasantly than he's sure Alexis sounded saying them. "But don't worry so much, kiddo. We both know your happiness is still our girl's main priority."

Castle had sighed, not so sure anymore, not if his happiness involved Kate.

"I hope so."

The spill of reporters from the building steals his attention, the clicks and flashes of the cameras filling the air, and Castle relishes the swell of pride in his chest as he watches Kate lead Bracken down the steps, through the crowd, with her head held high and triumph in her every step, victory shimmering in her eyes. A hero who has finally conquered her tragedy.

She hands her mother's murderer off to Ryan and Esposito, allowing them to escort a handcuffed Bracken into the police car. She watches for a moment, her chest expanding beneath the barrier of her trench coat, before she turns her head to see him, the corners of her mouth lifting in a barely discernible smile.

Beckett walks the few feet to reach him, stands at his side as the car begins to move, merging onto the street with William Bracken inside, scowling at them both.

"She's proud of you," Castle tells her, offering a gentle quirk of his lips. "Wherever she is, she's proud."

Kate smiles back at him, drifting in closer and shaking her head. "I never could have done this without you."

He ignores the urge to deny it, to insist that she would have achieved this victory no matter what, and instead, he steps into the draw of her hand at his wrist, the wrap of her arms around his torso. Kate sucks in a shallow breath against his neck, some of her nervous energy evaporating as he embraces her, rubs his palm between her shoulder blades and allows her a moment of rest.

The tip of her nose kisses the skin below his ear, her cheek pressing to the line of his throat, and he feels when the smile graces her lips once more.

"What now?" she murmurs, her hands slipping down his back to rest at his waist as she lifts her head, her eyes rising to search his face.

Castle strokes the windblown strands of hair back from her face, holds them there behind her ear with his thumb. "For tonight, we go home. Your place or mine, I don't care, and after that… we take this step by step, Kate. We move on with our lives, together."

Her eyes ripple with gold, determination laced with anticipation brightening the amber shade of her irises, illuminating the streaks of forest green.

"I like the sound of that," she whispers, finding his hand at the small of her back and twining their fingers, guiding him towards the badass new Charger she had been upgraded to during their time apart. "Would tonight at my place be okay? Then tomorrow morning, I have a meeting with Gates, but after… we can do whatever you want."

"Like have lunch with my mother at the loft?" Castle suggests with a wince, but Kate only chuckles in response. "She's been worried, about us both."

They slow to a stop on the sidewalk in front of her car and Beckett twists to face him, her eyes still that gorgeous mixture of amber and green, gentled but alight with flecks of gold, and her lips in a soft grin. So stunning, he almost forgets their topic of conversation entirely and drifts in to kiss her instead.

"Lunch with your mom is great, Castle. The same goes for Alexis, if you still want us to-"

"That'd probably be smart, yeah," he agrees, tracing his thumb along the path of her knuckles at the apprehension that flares to life in her gaze. "It's going to work out. No matter what happens."

Kate nods, leans in to steal a kiss from his lips, chaste but still causing his heart to stutter.

"For now, let's just go home."

* * *

"I missed this place," Castle quips, folded comfortably into her couch with a pleasant grin on his face, and she returns his smile while she pours two glasses of wine from the kitchen.

He looks good in her apartment, always has, but even more so now. Now that he's back, breathing life into the home that had once been her haven, ultimately turned to just another dark space of despair during his absence.

"And it was so nice of Internal Affairs to pay to have your locks changed and everything," he muses, accepting the glass of wine she hands him.

"They break it, they buy it," Kate murmurs, maneuvering around her coffee table to take a seat at his side, grateful for the curl of his arm at her shoulders, the gentle dusting of his fingers over her bicep when she rests her head to his clavicle.

By the time they had made the drive back to her apartment, night had fallen and the overdue exhaustion of the last few days had settled deep in her bones. He had stood by her as she'd delicately laid the chain carrying her mother's ring to rest in a keepsake box, tucked it in safely within her bedroom, and then he'd ordered takeout from their favorite Chinese restaurant that she hadn't been able to stomach since they had parted ways.

"You okay?" Castle asks, stretching forward to deposit his glass to the table, plucking hers from her limp fingers before she manages to spill it over both their laps.

"Yeah, it's still so surreal," she sighs out, toying with the fingers he rests atop her crossed knees.

"You're using that word a lot lately," he mumbles, his lips skirting her temple.

"Can't think of a synonym. We're not all best-selling authors," she mutters, earning a quiet huff of his laughter through her hair. "It's just - we came back to the city, Bracken's been taken into custody, you're sitting on my couch."

"It's been quite the day," he affirms and Kate lifts her head, studies the man staring back at her with a gentle smile and riveting blue eyes, love on display in his gaze. For her.

Rick Castle loves her and it still blows her away.

"Thank you." He tilts his head in response and the smile blooms wide and unbidden across her lips as her hand rises to his jaw, caressing the skin peppered with stubble, trapping the lobe of his ear between her thumb and forefinger. "For coming to get me."

The corners of his mouth quirk and Castle drifts forward to touch his lips to the crown of her head.

"Always," he mumbles into her hair, squeezing the hand still encased within his. "From now on, always. I promise you that, Kate."

She winds her arm around his neck, breathes in the scent of his skin, of oil and coffee and his aftershave. Castle releases her hand to hold her, allow her settlle against the plane of his chest, her cheek over the beat of his heart while he strokes tender fingers through her hair, lulling her to sleep with the delicate patterns her traces across her scalp that she soon realizes are the paths of her healing head wounds.

She drifts like that for a while, fisting her hand in his shirt to keep herself awake, but she knows Castle can sense the exhaustion taking over, dragging her down.

"Let's go to bed," the husk of his voice floats into her ear, his body shifting beneath her, and Kate hums her agreement, follows him to stand from the couch, glancing up in confusion when he fails to move. "I - uh, I've never actually been to your bedroom."

A laugh flutters past her lips despite the glowering look he gives her and Kate rises on her toes, smears a kiss to his exaggerated frown, and guides him towards the short hall that leads to her bedroom.

"If I wasn't so dead on my feet, I'd give you a proper welcome," she sighs as she leads him into her room, a little disappointed that she can't indulge in the idea.

Well, she _could_ , but the fatigue that laces through her limbs and pounds a resounding beat through her skull advises against it.

"A good night of sleep, knowing there's no longer a bounty on your head, is welcome enough," Castle chuckles at her back, already unbuttoning his shirt, and she takes a moment to study him, thoroughly examine the smudges of purple beneath his eyes and the weight of his drooping lids, so ready to close.

"Here," she mumbles when his fingers miss a button, turning to step into his space, dislodge the remaining discs holding his shirt together, aiding the descent of the fabric over his shoulders, down his arms. "I have a drawer, if you want."

She tugs on the drawer to the dresser that she'd cleared out a few weeks ago after getting rid of some old t-shirts, empty and waiting to be filled.

"But if not, I'm sure I have an extra hanger in my closet-"

"Drawer is fine, Kate," he assures her, his lips in a grin. "I'm actually surprised. My first night at your place and I already have a drawer of my own."

Her eyes roll at the tease in his tone and she bumps his shoulder with her own, moves past him for the adjoining bathroom.

"Just take off your clothes, put them in your drawer, and meet me in the bed," she murmurs, stripping of her own clothing, tossing the button down blouse into the hamper, her bra and her slacks joining the pile, and retrieving a worn t-shirt from the drawer next to his.

"I'll clear out a drawer for you at my place too. An entire closet space if you want," he quips, trailing after her into the bathroom, accepting the extra toothbrush she offers him with a delighted shimmer in his eyes.

"Day by day, Castle. We have a lot of missed time to make up for," she reminds him, treading lightly, because as grateful as she is to finally be with him, to have him back, the reality is that they've only been together for a matter of days.

And the last thing she wants is for them to crash and burn due to bad timing all over again.

"No, I know," he manages around the swish of the toothbrush in his mouth. "I don't want to rush anything, but I don't want to waste any time either." He bumps her hip when he leans over the sink to cleanse his mouth of toothpaste, rinse his toothbrush under the faucet and place it neatly in the holder. "I think we'll both know when the timing is right."

Her lips twitch around her toothbrush while she finishes up in the bathroom, watching him in the mirror as he trots to her bed, climbs onto his side without hesitation. God, they already have sides.

"But I bet I'll have you moving into the loft within six months."

"Castle," she scolds, spitting into the sink and dropping her toothbrush in its slot next to his, shutting off the bathroom light and traveling the short distance to the bed.

He's already lying down in the darkness, the pleased smile on his face illuminated by the lights of the city peeking through the curtains covering her windows. Kate crawls in alongside him, trying not to return the giddy expression he wears, how monumental it feels to share her most intimate space with him, how easy it is to forget all the good, all the bad, everything, that has happened when she's settling beneath the sheets beside him.

"Okay?" he murmurs, his amusement fading as he rotates onto his side. Kate nods her reassurance, finding his hand atop her comforter and drawing his arm over her waist while she rolls to rest with her back to his chest.

Castle reflexively hauls her closer, fits her body within the cove of his, and she sighs contently.

"Hey Castle?" The warmth of his breath hits the back of her neck when he hums his acknowledgement and Beckett squeezes the fingers laced with hers. "I'll take that bet."

* * *

 **A/N: Thank you to everyone who took the time to read this story and offer me any form of feedback. I so greatly appreciate your thoughts and support. And to Evan for being this story's most reliable cheerleader, always so consistently ready to offer assistance and encouragement, and Nadia, for the brilliant pieces of art you created for this fic.**


End file.
